Bundesregierung: Kabinett beschließt Reform der Einkommensteuer

Bundesbildungsministerin Karin Prien (CDU) has hailed the "Startchancen- und Qualitätsentwicklungsgesetz für Kitas" as the "largest education policy project of this coalition". On Wednesday, the Cabinet approved the legislation, which mandates language tests for all four-year-olds in Germany. The assessment will also evaluate developmental progress, including social-emotional abilities, motor skills, and mathematical competence.

If a need for support is identified, mandatory support for children will be required in the future. The nationwide standards will be outlined in the Social Code (SGB), with the federal government providing around 9.25 billion euros to support all planned measures between 2027 and 2034. The legislation builds upon the 2019 "Gute-Kita-Gesetz" introduced by then-Family Minister Franziska Giffey (SPD), which allowed for varied measures to improve childcare quality and alleviate costs for parents.

However, no unified standards were established at that time. The new tests aim to ensure that only children with sufficient language skills and abilities are enrolled to follow the curriculum. According to the legislation, this will contribute particularly to reducing educational inequality and providing fair start opportunities when evaluations and subsequent support occur well before school entry and reach as many children as possible.

Research shows that performance differences largely develop before school entry and cannot be significantly compensated in later educational stages. The legislation considers "ethnic origin" when considering support. Currently, children come to school with very different prerequisites, such as their background, social environment, or family circumstances.

Thus, the legislation focuses on early childhood education, education, and care. The legislation aims to provide support for many children, particularly those with non-German family languages, as kindergartens or daycare centers are often the first places where they experience intensive contact with the German language. However, the tests are also intended for children who do not attend kindergarten.

The majority of children in Germany, including those without a kindergarten background, are expected to attend some form of childcare by the time they enter primary school. As of 2024, the childcare participation rate for children under three years old was 37.4 percent, while children aged three to six years old had a participation rate of 91.6 percent.

The future mandatory support in kindergartens will consider age, developmental stage, language skills, and other abilities, family circumstances, and the individual child's interests and needs, including their ethnic background. The legislation cites the federal-state cooperation model in the "Gute-Kita-Gesetz" as a basis for the new approach.

Similar to the "Startchancen-Programm" in schools, which provided targeted support to around 4,000 schools with a high proportion of socially disadvantaged students, kindergartens with a significant number of children facing challenging circumstances will see improvements in staffing.