Dresden's school building in crisis: million-dollar investments in jeopardy!

Dresden's school building in crisis: million-dollar investments in jeopardy!

What is happening in school construction? In recent years, Dresden has invested heavily in its school buildings. Billions flowed into the renovation of dilapidated school buildings and into the construction of new important projects such as the Pieschen school campus and the Tolkewitz dual location. But the good news could soon end - the Free State has set the funding for school building construction to zero, which endangers the plans for the next few years. School mayor Jan Donhauser emphasizes: “I will fight” to obtain these funds because he is faced with the challenge of disappointing many hopes and having to make difficult decisions in the city council.

The new 101st high school on Cockerwiese is almost finished, but without a financial basis the construction will come to a standstill. Given this situation, it is clear that the interface between architects, educators and decision-makers is more important than ever. Barbara Pampe and Meike Kricke from the Montag Foundation for Youth and Society emphasize the need to combine architecture and pedagogy in order to create sustainable school buildings that meet the needs of students and teachers. Money alone cannot be the solution; A rethinking of investments is needed.

School construction as a task for society as a whole

The information about school construction in Germany is diverse and shows that there is a need for action not only in Dresden, but nationwide. Each federal state has its own guidelines and funding programs that support school construction (Bildungsserver reports that…). In Baden-Württemberg, municipal and private school authorities are responsible, while in Berlin a school building offensive was decided in 2017 to improve the infrastructure.

A central point of the discussion is the investment backlog in school construction, which endangers the quality of teaching and learning. The Association for Education and Upbringing (VBE) therefore calls for the allocation of funding to be tied to central quality criteria. This could result in a long overdue structural change in the educational landscape and significantly improve the efficiency in the use of resources.

The challenges of the future

With the number of students in cities like Hamburg increasing by 40,000 by 2030, we are all called upon to make the school infrastructure fit for the future. The federal-state working group has agreed and has a clear goal in mind with the position paper: school construction should act as a booster for educational development. This means not only carrying out new buildings and renovations, but also improving the quality of the rooms with regard to teaching.

In Dresden, the addition of eleven drinking fountains ensures that students are better supplied with free fluids, which represents a small ray of hope in an otherwise gloomy school construction chapter. However, the city lacks the money and the right concepts to sustainably overcome the challenges ahead.

With all of these factors, from financing to quality to practical implementation, school construction remains a central and currently pressing issue that concerns and affects us all.

In times when the education system is changing rapidly, it should be clear: school building doesn't just mean walls and roofs, but much more - it's about the future, education and the well-being of the next generations.

For further information about school construction and funding programs in Germany, the publicly accessible data is available at the addresses of the education servers or on the VBE website, which provides numerous helpful resources.

Further details about these training and construction measures and their progress can be found on dnn.de, bildungsserver.de and vbe.de be read.