Linke on education

The Left wants to pass an education package worth 300 million euros. The money is meant for more staff and for individual support for children. The party also wants to negotiate what it calls an education peace agreement.

The Left wants to spend 300 million euros more on education. The money should pay for more staff. Children should get better support. The party also wants a firm agreement on education. It calls this an education peace.

The package is meant to strengthen staffing and individual support. In the party's view, good education needs time, good conditions and enough people to deliver it. The proposed education peace agreement is supposed to secure continuous educational paths, the survival of school locations, good working conditions and reliable teaching coverage. The program pays special attention to the transitions from daycare to school and from school to training or university.

The Left wants daycare to remain free of parental fees and wants to improve quality, starting with nurseries and after-school care. Groups are to become smaller step by step. The party also wants a mandatory preschool year.

Daycare should stay free for parents. Groups should get smaller. A nursery group should have four children. An after-school group should have 18 children. Before school starts, there should be a required preschool year.

Group sizes are to fall gradually to four children in nurseries and 18 in after-school care. Every child is to be guaranteed a daycare place close to home. Language skills of all children aged four and a half are to be assessed, and additional language specialists are to improve support. The party wants to push the federal government to create Startchancen daycare centers (centers with extra support) and to strengthen specialized centers, for example for swimming or Low German. A mandatory preschool year is meant to ease the move into school.

The Left wants to give schools considerably more staff and build teams drawn from different professions. Teachers would in the future be required to teach only 25 hours per week. Every school is to have school social work.

The Left wants more staff in schools. This includes teachers, helpers and psychologists. Teachers should teach fewer hours each week. Every school should have a school social worker. This should give teachers more time for children.

The plan includes 950 additional teaching positions, 500 everyday assistants, 300 supporting educational specialists, 100 administrative staff and 100 psychologists. School principals are to receive 2,000 additional credited hours, for example to fund a second deputy. The required teaching load is to fall gradually to 25 hours per week at all school types. The media education center is to get more staff. Elementary and regional schools are to get pay-grade upgrades that take the place of promotions, and vocational schools a dedicated homeroom period.

The Left wants students to experience democracy in practice in everyday school life. Student councils at every level are to receive more money and more rights. Mandatory class councils, a project day and mock elections are added to this.

Students should have more say at school. Student councils should get more money and more rights. Every class should have a class council. Once a year there should be a project day about democracy. All schools should hold mock elections for young students.

District and city student councils are to be funded uniformly and better, receive their own budgets, and be allowed to submit motions and speak. Student representatives are to get time off for training and take part in developing curricula. Homeroom periods are to become mandatory and be run as class councils; the education ministry is to prepare guidance for teachers. A yearly mandatory project day is meant to make participation options known. Mock elections at all schools are aimed at students under 16, and a network is to connect student councils and youth advisory boards.

The Left wants to make everyday school life less stressful for students. Grades in art, music and physical education are to be dropped, and no more than two exams or tests per week would be allowed. The party points to stress and overwork, especially among children from poorer families.

The Left wants less stress at school. There should be no more grades in art, music and sports. There should be at most two tests per week. There should be a new subject on relationships, sex and health. Students should get digital devices from their school.

Grading in art, music and physical education is to end, unless the subjects are taken as advanced courses. Schools are to receive guidelines on breaks and provide quiet rooms and common rooms. Resilience training and study skills are to be added to curricula. A subject on relationships, sex education and health is to be created on the British model. The plan also includes digital devices for all students, free menstrual products, vouchers for learning materials and anonymous feedback forms on teaching.

The Left wants at least one school social worker at every school, permanently funded through a state program. It also wants more mental health services for young people. The platform says children and teenagers are increasingly strained by stress and crises.

Every school should get at least one school social worker. The state should pay for this for good. There should also be more mental health help for children. The Left says children suffer more and more from stress and crises.

The plan calls for more psychotherapists, digital support services and school psychologists across the state. Skills such as coping with stress and emotions and healthy behavior are to be taught as part of everyday school life. School social work would be secured permanently through a state program, with at least one position per school.

The Left wants to turn all special-needs schools into inclusive mainstream schools step by step. Children with and without disabilities would then learn together. The platform sees inclusion as a task for society as a whole.

The Left wants to change special schools step by step. They should become regular schools for all children. Children with and without disabilities then learn together.

The conversion would happen gradually and cover every special-needs school (Förderschule) in the state. The goal is mainstream schools that work inclusively. The Left places this within its aim of removing barriers and enabling equal participation.

The Left wants BAföG (federal student aid) that is paid regardless of parents' income, does not have to be repaid and is above the poverty line. Cafeterias would offer at least one daily meal for no more than 2.50 euros. In the party's view, studying should not depend on background or income.

Students should get money from the state no matter what their parents earn. They do not have to pay it back. The cafeteria should offer one meal a day for 2.50 euros at most. There should be more places in student housing.

The Left wants to prevent rising semester fees and rejects tuition fees for international students. The student services organizations (Studierendenwerke) are to get enough funding, create more dorm places and use the federal "Junges Wohnen" (Young Housing) program for that. Their psychosocial counseling is to be made permanent and expanded. University access for people with vocational qualifications is to become easier, and students with care duties, jobs or disabilities would get accommodations.

The Left wants permanent positions for ongoing tasks at universities and a collective agreement for student employees. The state's base funding for universities is to rise. To protect academic freedom, universities are to be given the right to appoint professors themselves.

Universities should have more permanent jobs. Students who work there should get a collective pay agreement. The state should give universities more money. Universities should decide themselves who becomes a professor.

All status groups are to get more say; student and academic assistants would be represented by the staff councils, and the special status of a separate assistants' representation would end. The student body is to remain independent and financially secure. The funding framework is to be reformed so that it shields academic freedom from authoritarian interference. Extra administrative positions are planned for growing tasks. Research is to cooperate more closely with municipalities, society and practitioners.

The Left wants to modernize the state's universities through a permanently funded digital pact and make them climate-neutral through investment. It also wants to attract more students and researchers from abroad to Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

The Left wants to modernize universities. A digital pact with steady funding should pay for this. University buildings should stop harming the climate. More people from other countries should study and do research here.

The platform calls for a digital pact for universities with lasting funding. Free software and openly accessible teaching and research materials are to be supported. Investment in buildings and infrastructure is meant to make universities climate-neutral. The state's university marketing is to be improved together with the universities, and universities are to open up as places of knowledge for the general public. The platform also lists binding target quotas for more women professors and women in leadership, and hiring committees with equal numbers of women and men.