In a harrowing interview, a long-time teacher in a predominately migrant school describes a “hellish” experience that involved “knife violence, bullying, and sexism.” Her testimony is laying bare the lie that diversity is always a strength, and her experience may help explain Germany’s plummeting PISA test scores and worsening educational outcomes.
Birgit Ebel has taught for 15 years at a “problem school,” where she says everyday life was an “absolute hell,” in her interview with Focus Magazine,
Ebel, who has since moved to a new school district, warns: “The system is coming back to haunt us.”
Ebel does not beat around the bush and is not afraid to say that foreigners are the main cause of the chaos in the school she spent years in.
“At our comprehensive school, 80 to 90 percent of the students had a migrant background. Many come from predominantly Islamic countries such as Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Algeria, Bosnia, Chechnya, Afghanistan or Pakistan, but also from Russia and North Africa.” Ebel says among these students are also refugees who fled war and harsh Islamic rule.
She says the connection between immigration and Germany’s disintegrating school system cannot be denied, but says the view is controversial.
“In my view, the connection cannot be denied. But hardly anyone dares to say it openly,” she said.
The extreme violence she saw was “mainly the responsibility of migrant students, i.e., male adolescents,” she said. “It’s more about who can hit or kick the fastest. And then the others even celebrate you for it. Many do martial arts, and a toned body is the ultimate plus.”
She said stronger boys who can handle weapons like brass knuckles and knives are considered “masculine” and others look up to them. Ebel added that many of the students are armed with such weapons and that it is “normal.”
Despite claims that “diversity is a strength” from the left, this teacher, who actually works with true diversity, saw the other side of the equation.
“The conflict between Turks and Kurds or between Muslims and Yazidis is almost always present,” she warned.
She also noted that sexism is far different for both male and female teachers, with male teachers avoiding the worst of it, which is also a product of the culture many of the students come from.
“When students insult us or want to offend, they usually do so in sexualized, fecal language,” she warned.
She told Focus that she was routinely insulted with incredibly brutal language, including students saying: “You old whore’s daughter,” “I’ll fuck your head,” “whore,” “slut,” “cunt,” and threats like “I’ll give you AIDS,” while others told her, “Shut up, you Jewish whore!”
Ebel said many of her colleagues also experienced such abuse. Other students praised Hamas, which became especially intense after Ebel showed her support for Israel after the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas.
She said that students would also play the race card, accusing her of being “racist” if she gave bad grades. In fact, parents also accused her of the same thing.
“Almost always the students played the racism card. And parents also joined in,” she said. In other cases, students have threatened to punch her for “insulting Islam,” including a student from Albania who barely spoke German. In that instance, she filed a criminal complaint but the investigation was dropped.
Ebel says that allegations of racism are “absurd,” as she is a member of the Kurdish community in Germany. She also belongs to an organization, the Society of Threatened Peoples, and has campaigned for human and women’s rights in Germany, especially in regard to Islamist movements, which she sees as being against these rights.
Although her experience sounds dire, violence and harassment in German schools are no longer uncommon in Germany. Last year alone, security authorities nationwide counted around 27,500 violent crimes such as knife attacks and assaults in schools, an increase of 27 percent compared to 2022. In Berlin, there are an average of five police operations every school day. However, those are just cases of outright violence. In terms of daily harassment, the numbers are far higher.
Ebel also provided a video to Focus Magazine she obtained that took place in her former school, which showed the brutal beating of one boy by four others, all while he screamed for help that never came. In fact, the beating took place directly in front of a teacher, who is seen fleeing the room. Ebel said that such violence was commonplace.
“I have experienced a systematic increase in violent behavior among children and young people, especially in the lower and middle grades,” she said.
Ebel also said a brawl between 20 students in the school saw five teachers try to enter the fight to break it up, with one pregnant colleague being punched in the stomach.
In 2011, her school was even nominated for the German School Prize; however, Ebel said that while the school was on the “right track” then, the educational environment has swiftly plummeted.
She also notes that the demographics in the school have rapidly shifted since that time.
“More and more poor people, parents without jobs, lack of German language skills, and so on. We were then considered a school for foreigners. The number of registrations fell drastically,” she said.
Other schools are seeing similar levels of violence, including the case of 17-year-old Sinan Y., who stabbed his vocational school teacher Sabine K. to death after she reprimanded him for aggressive behavior. She died in the classroom in front of her students. Her attacker then committed suicide while in custody.
As Remix News has previously reported, there are a record number of violent attacks in the Berlin school system, with the police being called five times per day on average to different schools.