The culture ministers of the federal states have started to develop strategies for the integration of refugee children and young people from Ukraine.

The Standing Scientific Commission of the Conference of Ministers of Education (SWK) became active in this regard.

She now recommends that daycare centers and schools concentrate on six points in order to be able to integrate the children into school lessons as smoothly as possible.

Heike Schmoll

Political correspondent in Berlin, responsible for “Bildungswelten”.

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Firstly, the children and young people should be supported in processing traumatic experiences during the war weeks and when fleeing.

Secondly, the Commission recommends language support in German, the language of education, and access to specialist teaching.

In addition to teaching, educational opportunities should be provided in the Ukrainian language.

Fourth, the children and young people should be integrated into new "friendship networks" as quickly as possible, for example through sport and other leisure and educational activities.

Fifth, Ukrainian teachers and pedagogical professionals should be offered qualification and further training measures.

Graduating classes should (if necessary) be taught digitally and tested on the basis of Ukrainian curricula.

The Berlin educational researcher Felicitas Thiel from Freie Universität estimates that 25 to 35 percent of children and young people from Ukraine suffer from severe mental stress.

"We know from research that, in addition to the family, positive contacts with people of the same age are important protective factors," said Thiel, one of the two chairmen of the SWK.

She therefore considers it all the more important to enable day-care and school attendance and to create school-based offers for coping with mental stress.

Teachers, therapists or pedagogical specialists who have fled Ukraine should be included if possible.

Language support even after switching to regular classes

The SWK considers high-quality language support to be essential right from the start, and it should not end even when the students switch to regular classes.

“At the same time, the refugee children and young people should be provided with educational opportunities in their native language.

This is not only important so that they can continue learning well after a possible return to Ukraine, but also for a well-founded examination of the history and culture of their country of origin," says Petra Stanat, Scientific Director of the Institute for Quality Development in Education (IQB) and member of SWK.

In order to involve the Ukrainian teachers as quickly as possible, they needed accompanying training and mentoring offers in order to quickly find their way around the new school system.

Experience with the further qualification of immigrant teachers has also been gained since 2015 at the University of Potsdam and many other universities with Syrian teachers.

Specifically, the SWK recommends supporting teachers with further training on school and teaching in Germany as well as on school law issues.

In addition, their tasks should be clearly described in order to provide orientation and security.

Since some of the teachers are likely to remain in Germany, the SWK considers it necessary to also examine the recognition of their teaching qualification with a subject.