"We've given it our all these past weeks! This cannot go on like this! We need relief."

Seven points for better education and care for children in crisis

This includes reliable teaching - both in the classroom and digitally, more tablets for financially disadvantaged pupils, better pay for educators and a right to education, including for children of parents from the risk group. They also call for more capacities in child and youth welfare services to prevent child welfare risks, more COVID-19 tests for educators and teachers and the promotion of private care groups, although this must not be a question of money.

"All the kids are tired of it"

The politician Janik Feuerhahn himself has two children who have to learn at home. But not only the parents' stress limits have been reached, the children don't want to study at home anymore. And with the missing desire, also the motivation for the school tasks falls:

"Every task was hard to get from the child, because the motivation is naturally very low when I sit alone in front of the task."

Creative solutions and a concrete plan for more teaching

"We demand more creative solutions, we demand above all that it is not simply a case of going to school now and not caring about anything else. Rather, we want there to be an opening now and then combined with a plan to make this opening successful. We cannot have forty, fifty, sixty percent of our lessons in August. And for that we need answers," said Feuerhahn.

Call for a petition

Under the hashtag #educational parental relief, parents and families connect on the net, demanding more support (#Educational parental discharge). And they have also launched a petition on openPetition under the following link https://www.openpetition.de/petition/online/recht-auf-bildung-und-betreuung-sichern-eltern-entlasten. Because they are not only concerned about today; and certainly not about the 300 Euro child bonus:

"There were considerations to actually issue a consumer voucher for every citizen in this country. And in order to link this to the family message, they have now thrown such a disguised economic stimulus at us. This has nothing whatsoever to do with educational justice, with family, relief or anything," says co-initiator, Bundestag employee and blogger Sabine Ponath.

After the Berlin Senate decisions of yesterday, Tuesday, which provide for full operation of the day-care centres from 22 June and the Berlin schools after the summer holidays, parents seem to have achieved initial success. In addition, the 1.5-metre distance rule will then be overridden and more tests will be available for staff, children and parents.

Published on 10.06.2020