HAMBURG — There was a moment when Merten Eichert considered throwing in the towel. It was in February 2021, and he thought: “This can’t be true.” The 51-year-old headmaster had just implemented mandatory COVID-19 testing in his school. A harmless decision, he thought. But shortly after, the father of a fourth-grader reported Eichert to the police as revenge.
The accusation: assault.
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Eichert has been the headmaster, or principal, of the Nord Primary School in Schifferstadt, in southwest of Germany, since 2007. Before that, he had been head of a smaller school in Kaiserslautern for two years. After 15 years he thought he had seen it all, but a report? When the police informed him, he was shocked: “I asked myself why in the hell I was still doing this job.” It was the first time he asked himself the question, but it wouldn’t be the last.
Headmasters used to have a popular job decades ago: being the boss, earning a good salary, helping shape how children learn. Yet according to weekly Der Spiegel, at least 1,400 school management positions are vacant in Germany. The situation is particularly critical in primary schools.
Positions with no applicants are often filled by interim headmasters for months or years. Teachers, for example, will take on the task for a short time, even though they are not necessarily familiar with the gig. But what is it that makes the job of headmaster so unattractive? And what needs to change?
Schools have changed
Last year, the Wübben Education Foundation published a study on the topic. It found that 40% of headmasters work more than 50 hours a week. It’s stressful. Almost one in five headmasters is thinking about leaving school. More than one in 20 want to get out “as quickly as possible.”
Pierre Tulowitzki, an educational management professor at the University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland, who led the study, said this is mainly because schools have changed.
I’m not a manager or a lawyer, I’m just a trained teacher.
For example, in the digital world, school principals often have more responsibility than before, particularly in financial matters. That can be overwhelming, especially because many do not have any special qualifications and have to learn everything by themselves. Added to this is the teacher shortage. “School principals have to invest a lot of their time in recruiting teachers,” Tulowitzki said.
Eichert said he finds the search for teachers stressful and even has to draw up the employment contracts himself. He doesn’t always know whether everything is legally sound: “I’m not a manager or a lawyer, I’m just a trained teacher.”
Not a manager
Tulowitzki said parents also play a part in the stressful working lives of headmasters: “They question the decisions of teachers and management much more than they did in the past.”
Well-to-do parents in particular have high expectations when it comes to syllabi, homework and grades. And unlike some decades ago, the digital revolution has made teachers and school management easier to contact. In addition to calls and emails, parents often have access to group chats that allow everyone, including teachers, to communicate with one another. “This sort of findability leads to more stress,” Tulowitzki said.
Eichert, who is active in the Education and Science Workers’ Union, also takes care of finding substitutes at his elementary school when colleagues call in sick. He checks in the morning whether absent children have the requisite excuse note. If not, he has to contact the families. Then, there are the internal meetings, badly cleaned rooms, assigning classes for the new school year, speaking to parents who show up unannounced, etc.
Lots of work, little pay
Eichert’s primary school, with around 540 children, is one of the largest in the southwest state of Rhineland-Palatinate. His job? “Only for idealists,” he say. You don’t run a school for the money.
In Rhineland-Palatinate, the gross monthly salary for primary school teacher with at least five years of professional experience is around 4,300 euros. A headmaster with the same professional experience can make around 4,800 euros at a small primary school, or up to 5,200 euros at a large primary school.
Many teachers come to the conclusion that a promotion to headmaster is not worth the hassle.
Teachers in Germany earn more than the international average, but headmasters earn only slightly more than their teacher colleagues, who have fewer responsibilities, Tulowitzki said: “Headmasters sometimes feel that they are paid unfairly, and many teachers come to the conclusion that a promotion to headmaster is not worth the hassle.”
So what is the solution? Educational scientist Anne Sliwka, of the University of Heidelberg, believes headmasters need more support with administrative tasks. That means an hiring office and assistant staff, so that the headmaster can focus more on the school’s pedagogical development.
Learning from Canada
Sliwka said it should be normal for German teachers to aim for a leadership position and to get training for it. In Canada, for example, every teacher can complete a 200-hour training course to become a school principal after a few years of work — and then apply for job offers.
In Germany, different federal states have different procedures that make it possible for experienced teachers to move into school management. Alternatively, Sliwka said, there are a few master’s degree programs. In her opinion, however, teachers in Germany know too little about this career path and they are not sufficiently prepared for it.
It could be helpful to distribute leadership differently, she said, suggesting, for example, having two principals lead a school: “One person could then be more focused on pedagogy, the other more concerned with management.”
In order for such dual leadership to be realistic, however, smaller schools would have to be merged. Sliwka also said head teachers would benefit from exchanging information more effectively, and here too she draws a comparison with Canada: “There, school principals work closely together and meet once a month under the leadership of the school inspectorate.”
Temporary management is not a solution
Sliwka said that many teachers who take on the temporary role of headmaster are victims of “a scam”: They are given the responsibility but not the corresponding legal status. Sliwka warns that the use of interim management means that the long-term development of the school is neglected. If you know that you are only taking on the position as a substitute for one year, you are more likely to put off long-term projects.
Helena Meyer*, in her mid-50s, knows what it means to take on several management tasks on an interim basis. For two years, she has been headmaster at a secondary school in the northwestern state of North Rhine-Westphalia, where she often works up to 52 hours a week. Meyer is currently on sick leave “due to stress.”
Why can’t people see how hard we try?
There are six people on the management team at Meyer’s school: a headmaster, a deputy headmaster, a teaching manager and three department heads. But when the headmaster retired more than 24 months ago, Meyer took over personnel planning, public relations, budgetary issues and much more.
Meyer said she also feels increasing social pressure: “We have to make sure that children are interested in economics, while at the same time promoting democracy and strengthening STEM subjects,” she said. There is a lack of recognition for the hard work that teachers do: “I always ask myself: Why can’t people see how hard we try?”
Meyer said there have been no applicants for the headmaster position at her school in the past two years. Meyer can understand that; she believes that the school system is scaring teachers away. “Who wants to take on a management position if you feel like you can’t make a difference anyway?” she said.
*Name has been changed to protect the source from professional consequences.
