Sweden: 'Immigrant kids need more schooling'

Sweden: 'Immigrant kids need more schooling'

Via the Local:

The Swedish government has revealed a new directive aimed at improving immigrant students’ education and integration into Sweden, revolving around longer compulsory schooling and a shift in lesson priorities.

(...)

Key issues regarding these foreign students, who make up nine percent of Sweden’s primary school student population, revolved around how to integrate the children and raise the quality of their education by considering lesson priorities and additional compulsory schooling.

“For recently arrived children, schooling is the key to integration. Students today are older when they come to Sweden. It puts greater demands on the Swedish schools that receive them,” wrote the government in the statement.

Only 63 percent of the foreign-born students passed their final high school exams in 2010, a trend the government indicated is worsening. 

(source)

Austria: Kurz tackles immigration at school level

Austria: Kurz tackles immigration at school level

Via the Austrian Times:

Integration Secretary Sebastian Kurz, 26, was at the ministry of interior affairs this week discussing with educationalists whether schools were failing in their mission of integration.

(...)

Going further, he stated how: ‘In the capital, the percentage of people of migrant stock rises to 39%. Vienna like many other European capitals has 150 languages spoken in its schools. At primary school level, one in two pupils is of a migration background, mostly from the Balkans and Turkey.

Under the motto, ‘Integration through achievement’, the question of language was a major theme as schools are frequently the last bastions of community in urban settings. Some Viennese schools in districts like Brigitenau and Ottakring have a migrant intake that is over 80%. 

(source)

Sweden: 'Smarter' immigrants coming

Sweden: 'Smarter' immigrants coming


Via the Local:

Non-European immigrants are arriving in Sweden with increasingly higher levels of education, according to a new study, although fewer highly-educated immigrants are arriving from Europe and the Nordic countries.

While only 31 percent of immigrants who arrived in Sweden prior to 1991 had some form of post-secondary education, 44 percent of immigrants who moved to Sweden after 2002 have some form of higher education.

The figures come from a comprehensive survey of the level of education of people in Sweden carried out by Statistics Sweden (Statistiska centralbyrĂ„n – SCB). 

(source)

Denmark: Schools to teach Islam class from first grade

Denmark: Schools to teach Islam class from first grade

Via the Copenhagen Post:

Danish students used to only learn about other religions once they had reached seventh grade, but a recent decision by parliament has introduced the teaching of other religions, such as Islam, into the Christianity studies curriculum at a much younger age

Derby: Unions stand together in fight against Muslim private school

Derby: Unions stand together in fight against Muslim private school

Via the Derby Telegraph (h/t DW):

THE two biggest teaching unions have announced they will fight the setting up of a Muslim free school in Derby.

Union leaders fear pupils at the planned school may not be taught by qualified teachers and are also concerned that, although it is planned to open in September, it does not yet have a suitable building.

They also say they are worried the school will not follow a "broad curriculum" and that it would harm the city's state schools by attracting away Muslim pupils.

(source)

Amsterdam: Students protest closure of meditation room

Amsterdam: Students protest closure of meditation room

Via RNW:

Islamic students at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, HvA, have taken to praying in a stairwell as a protest against the closure of the school’s meditation room. They hope to force the school to provide them with their own prayer room. However, the school board is refusing to meet their demands.

(source)

Denmark: DPP says Muslims are racist for sending children to private schools

Denmark: DPP says Muslims are racist for sending children to private schools

Via Fyens Stiftstidende (Danish):

Alex Ahrendtsen, education spokesperson for the Danish People's Party (DPP), said Muslim parents who send their children to private schools are 'little racists'

Ahrendtsen was speaking to TV 2 NEWS, which reported that immigrant children go to private schools more than ethnic Danish children (14% of Danes vs. 15% of immigrant children)

Germany: First university department of Islamic theology

Germany: First university department of Islamic theology

KU Leuven: No exams on religious holidays

KU Leuven: No exams on religious holidays

Via VRT:

Leuven University has decided to allow students to move the date of their exam if this conflicts with a holiday in their religion. The university has now drawn up a list of holidays that qualify.

The holidays all occur in the calendars of the Christian, Jewish and Moslem faiths. They include the Orthodox Church's Easter, the Jewish New Year and Greater Eid.

(source)

North Rhine-Westphalia: Islamic studies gain foothold in state schools

North Rhine-Westphalia: Islamic studies gain foothold in state schools

Finland: Police called in to settle Islamic teaching dispute

Finland: Police called in to settle Islamic teaching dispute

Via the Tundra Tabloids:

The State Police (SUPO) was involved in a dispute during the autumn in a school in Tampere concerning a controversy which arose between the teacher and the parents of children over the Islamic religious education that they were receiving.

The situation came to a head when according to Muslim representatives the teacher was not teaching their religion properly nor cared about the values​​ of the Koran.

(source)

Denmark: Immigrant families reject special-ed schools

Denmark: Immigrant families reject special-ed schools

Via Avisen (Danish):

In many immigrant families, parents object to their children being sent to special-ed schools.

"We use many resources to convince them that their children can't take part in regular classes. It's a crack in the family's pride, and often the parents decide in advance to change schools - typically to an ethnic private school," Sabah El Tawil, a teacher at RĂ„dmandsgade School (Copenhagen), told Jyllands-Posten.

Belgium: Teacher suspended for discriminating against students without headscarves

Belgium: Teacher suspended for discriminating against students without headscarves

Via De Standaard (Dutch):

Mohammed G. (58) has been teaching in the Royal Athenum Verdi in Verviers since 2004. In 2010 an inspector reported 'bizarre behavior' by the teacher, and informed the school that the teacher preached radical points of view in his lessons.

The school investigated, resulting in a disastrous report by two inspectors. One student said that Mohammed had told her that her mother would burn in hell because her mother was Catholic. Another that the teacher reproached her, a Muslim girl, for walking hand-in-hand with a boy.

UK: Islamic schools flourish to meet demand

UK: Islamic schools flourish to meet demand

Germany: Muslim pupils allowed to pray, except when it sparks conflict

Germany: Muslim pupils allowed to pray, except when it sparks conflict

London: Schools to tackle genital mutilation

London: Schools to tackle genital mutilation

Via Deutsche Welle:

It is estimated that some 20,000 girls in the UK could be subjected to FGM. Each year, 6,500 girls in central London alone could face FGM, making it the city with the highest number of girls at risk in Europe.

Now London hopes to curb the practice by raising awareness through the integration of FGM education in secondary school curriculum. The London Metropolitan Police have teamed up with the agency Kids Taskforce and the local Lilian Baylis School to create a video featuring young girls learning about FGM's consequences through interviewing various authorities. The video is part of an FGM resource pack for teachers and students, and can be downloaded by schools using a password.
"I think it's absolutely vital that boys and girls know about this subject," said Detective Sergeant Vicky Washington from the London Metropolitan Police. "It may not be that they are at risk, but they could be exposed to someone who is. It's also about educating young people that this is happening and that it's child abuse and violence against women and has horrific debilitating effects, both short and long-term."

(source)

Oslo: Apartheid row as teachers segregate ethnic students

Oslo: Apartheid row as teachers segregate ethnic students

Finland: Lack of Islam teachers

Finland: Lack of Islam teachers

Via Österbottens Tidning (Swedish):

More Islam teachers are needed in elementary schools in Finland, although according to the National Board of Education, the situation is about to get better.

The board of education estimates there are more Muslim than Orthodox students. They each make up about 1% of the total number of students. Today Islam teachers are a diverse group, according to the University of Helsinki.

Oslo: Muslim students denied high school prayer slot

Oslo: Muslim students denied high school prayer slot

(The article speaks of 40 students, but as can be seen in the picture and video, there were only 4)

Luxembourg: Ministry proposes allowing separate gym classes, prayer rooms

Luxembourg: Ministry proposes allowing separate gym classes, prayer rooms

Via Tageblatt 1, 2 (German, h/t Politically Incorrect)

A new draft proposal by the Luxembourg Ministry of Education proposes allowing headscarves, prayer rooms, and separate gym classes for boys and girls. The proposal was sent to school principals for peer review, and was leaked by the local humanist association.