Michael
Espendiller
Digitalization
Education
German
Bundestag, July 2, 2020, Plenarprotokoll 19/170, pp. 21257-21258
[Michael Espendiller is an Alternative für
Deutschland Bundestag member from the western German state of
Nordrhein-Westfalen. He is a mathematician.]
The
magenta socialists of the FDP have again carved out a motion on the cutting
edge [hippen] theme of “Digitalization
in Education”. Unfortunately, dear colleagues of the FDP, I must say: You have
really not yet heard the shot! This motion completely by-passes the reality of
our schools. This motion even completely by-passes the digitalization theme;
since the main problems with Corona were not faulty equipment or conceptual
ideas, but faulty WLAN, over-burdened networks and faulty crisis management.
Yet, if you were to be followed, dear magentas, we would only bring up in our
schools complete idiots who look at a couple of on-line Erklär videos and then
call that learning.
Michael Theurer (FDP): Who then all
vote for the AfD, Herr colleague!
To
your motion: You posit the steep thesis that the means of only the DigitalPakt
Schools will not be retrieved because the instructions are too complicated. On
that account, you propose that the corresponding instructions shall not be
applied until the end of 2021. I gave that some consideration and I must say:
If the schools are actually unable to go on-line to read through a couple of
pages to fulfill the requirements, then neither should they be let loose on our
children.
Jens Brandenburg (FDP): You obviously
have no idea how that works!
I
know our school principals and I know our schools and I quite exactly
understand that the problem is not here. That is to say, you are on the utterly
wrong path, dear FDP, and that already since the beginning of this legislative
period. For two years, I have spoken on this theme to you, that we have left
our schools and teachers alone with a mountain of duties and work. One example:
Instead of strengthening special needs schools [Förderschulen], our teachers shall push a false presentation of
inclusion. They shall besides shoulder the main burden of integration. And then
the teachers shall also conduct the eco-propaganda, nicely named “Education for
Sustainable Development” and which shall be built into each department. And
then there shall naturally be the digitalization.
Worthy
colleague politicians, you must be completely deranged. We have a teacher
scarcity at all levels, over-sized classes and a deficient child care ratio.
Those are the problems we must address. I have in the meantime spoken on this
theme for two years and nothing has happened. We have no additional teachers,
our teachers receive no additional time for preparation of instruction or for
extra instruction. We need more personnel! When will you finally get that into
your heads? You cannot assign ever more duties and at the same time not
increase the personnel.
In
the Corona crisis we have certainly witnessed schools and teachers who have
taken the initiative so as to adjust their instruction as best as possible to
the conditions and to digitalization. And even here they were once again left
alone because in the ministries of the neither the states nor the Federal
government were there emergency plans as to how to deal with such a situation.
Kai Gehring (Greens): Are you now for or against
digitalization? Is there or is there not Corona? What then is now your
position?
Despite
that, the teachers have made the best of it. Yes, there are a couple of black
sheep and it is by far not perfect; yet the digitalization leap in education
which we have made throughout, we all may presently see. And for that, we
require no one from the dear FDP. Besides, you therefore perhaps have not a
single word of thanks in your motion for our teachers who in the face of Corona
have performed massive work, or for the teachers who have shouldered the double
burden of home office and home schooling.
Basically
–this I still wish to add – we could gladly keep up on digital learning
concepts. But we of the AfD want first of all that our students be securely
based in the traditional Kulturtechniken of
reading, writing and figuring.
Matthias Seestern-Pauly (FDP): That
does not exclude one of the others!
Besides
that, information has an equal right to be gladly taken up as a fourth Kulturtechnik. For that, however, we
require more than ever a strong presence culture in the schools and sufficient, motivated teachers. On that account, we reject
the motion of the FDP.
Thanks.
Matthias Seestern-Pauly (FDP):
Again, a revelation!
[Translation by Todd Martin]
