Educational Institutions - The significance of Russian as a second language is dwindling.
The importance of Russian in Thuringian schools is diminishing: In recent times, the number of educators competent to instruct this foreign language has substantially decreased, alongside the number of pupils learning Russian. This can be seen through the Thuringian Education Ministry's reply to a minor inquiry by Left MPs Andreas Schubert and Torsten Wolf. Based on the ministry's information, exactly 1900 Russian language teachers were in the state during the academic year 2018/2019. Unfortunately, their numbers have been continuously falling. There were roughly 1350 Russian language teachers in the 2022/2023 academic year.
A significant reason for this decline is because many educators from the Thuringian education system have retired in recent years. These individuals attended school during the era of the German Democratic Republic or trained as teachers during this time. In the GDR, Russian was a required foreign language subject. It was also significant for many students in East Germany during their studies prior to the Wall coming down.
On the other hand, fewer and fewer youngsters in Thuringia are learning the Russian language, both in terms of the total number of students in the state and about individual learners. The ministry's data reveals that there were nearly 245,000 students in the state during the 2019/2020 academic year, of whom about 6.9% were learning Russian as a second language. Despite an increase in student numbers to almost 258,000 children and young adults in the 2023/2024 academic year, the percentage of Russian language learners plummeted to just 4.9%.
In absolute numbers, the number of children and young people learning these languages lowered from approximately 17,000 in the 2019/2020 school year to less than 13,000 in the current one. Notably, relatively few students in Eastern Thuringia were taught Russian, whereas schools in North and Central Thuringia saw fewer students than the state average attempting to decipher Cyrillic letters and utterings.
According to the ministry's response to the two parliamentarians, instruction in Russian is still provided at approximately 190 schools in Thuringia this academic year. The majority of these classes are held at standard schools and gymnasiums. However, it's also evident that this subject is being introduced less and less at schools in the long run - a development that can be attributed to the fact that fewer teachers are capable of teaching this subject. "The creation of courses can only occur within the confines of the personnel, financial, and spatial resources and organizational possibilities of the school," the ministry's response indicates.
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The decrease in Russian language teachers in Thuringia has been noticed by Left MPs Andreas Schubert and Torsten Wolf, who inquired about the matter to the Thuringian Education Ministry. Despite being a required subject in the German Democratic Republic, fewer children in Erfurt and Thuringia are learning Russian as a second language today. The BMBF (Federal Ministry of Education and Research) should consider implementing initiatives to encourage the teaching and learning of Russian in schools across Germany.
