The federal and state governments want to invest two billion euros to close the learning gaps in children and young people caused by the corona virus.

One billion is earmarked for learning deficits in the core subjects, the other for early childhood education and social projects to mitigate psychological and physical consequences.

The federal and state governments agreed on this a good year ago because they want to prevent “existing inequalities from being manifested”.

As is so often the case with federal-state programs, the states are happy to take the money and also want to retain full decision-making authority over how it is spent.

Heike Schmoll

Political correspondent in Berlin, responsible for “Bildungswelten”.

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Since these were sales tax points and also an election gift from the then Federal Minister of Education Anja Karliczek (CDU) and the former Federal Minister for Family Affairs Franziska Giffey (SPD), the federal states were given a lot, possibly too much freedom for the use of funds.

However, such funding programs are fundamentally subject to the provisions of the Federal Budget Code and must be checked.

For this reason, and based on the experiences with earlier joint programs (all-day school expansion), the federal states had to submit an interim report to the federal government by March 31 of this year on how they were using the money.

Accountability for the school programs went to the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and for the extracurricular and early childhood programs to the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs.

If you want to take on the learning deficits, you first have to know exactly where they actually are.

And that's where the problems begin.

By no means every state has surveyed the learning status of all students, although the Standing Scientific Commission of the Conference of Ministers of Education (SWK) had expressly advised them to do so.

The recommendations of the independent advisory body of the Conference of Ministers of Education also included the concentration on the weak, the focus on German and mathematics as well as the core subjects and the special consideration of the transitional phases in the course of education.

Baden-Württemberg and to some extent Schleswig-Holstein have been guided by it most consistently.

However, learning level tests were not used consistently in Schleswig-Holstein.

In other federal states, everything possible was financed with the money, even swimming teachers.

As important as it may be for children to learn to swim, swimming is likely to be ineffective in catching up on specific corona learning gaps.

And why should the “expansion of Low German and Saterland Frisian support” mitigate the consequences of Corona?

There is no sign of an overall strategy

Some countries don't even seem to have known exactly what to do with the money.

The SWK did not find holiday courses and other extra-curricular offers effective enough if they were not linked to longer-term programs integrated into the lessons.

In addition, there is a shortage of skilled workers in all countries.

In order to offer additional lessons or support hours, it is not enough to further qualify a few students.

This requires greater pedagogical skills.