It’s not enough anymore. For the first time in decades, the education administration has refrained from announcing that all positions in Berlin’s public schools can be filled: “100 percent is the goal, but we know that we can’t do it,” is the central message with regard to the new school year .

As the Tagesspiegel reported in advance, Berlin is short of up to 1000 teachers (T ), because lateral entrants are no longer enough. Education Senator Astrid-Sabine Busse (SPD) has now confirmed this information by citing the gap as “920”. In the Senate, she explained the consequences of the shortage for the distribution of personnel.

The focus is on helping schools that are having the hardest time finding enough teachers, and which in the past have sometimes only been able to fill around 90 percent of their vacancies, while others have exceeded 100 percent. Therefore, the school authorities in the regions should ensure that applicants are diverted. This means that if a school has about 98 percent staffing and could hire a desirable math teacher, it may not be able to do so because another school is even worse off.

However, Senator Busse attaches importance to the fact that the lessons themselves, i.e. the prescribed timetable, are not in danger: “We have enough teachers in the system for that,” she emphasized. Instead, the schools should cancel the other offers.

It is up to each school to decide where to start. This can be part of the funding offers, a previous focus for a specific school profile or the pool for hourly discounts that schools have at their disposal. “This is a disaster, because divisional teaching to support weak students and substitute teaching will be the first victims,” ​​commented Paul Fresdorf (FDP) on the announcement.

The chairman of the Association of Senior Studies Directors (VOB), Arnd Niedermöller, said that “in principle” he welcomed the attempt to control the recruitment. Solidarity is needed with the schools, which find it difficult to meet their needs. However, the control must be closely coordinated between schools and school supervisory authorities so that it does not happen that lessons cannot be covered at a school due to a failed setting.

For the Greens, education politician Louis Krüger said it was “good that we finally have honest figures about how big the problem really is”. Now the education administration must offer good solutions that do justice to the extent of the problem. The talks in the coalition would now be held on this: “But it is already clear to us that it must not be at the expense of those with the greatest need for support”.