Germany is now a tuition-free country, with the nation’s last holdout, the southern state of Lower Saxony, announcing last week that it too was completely abolishing higher education fees for students.
While the idea of the German government providing a free college education for everybody who wants it goes way back historically, a legal change occurred in 2006 that opened the door for institutions to start charging modest assessments for students.
Predictably, the decision by some institutions to take advantage of the change and start charging tuition triggered an immediate revolt during which most universities subsequently scrapped all fees again.
“We got rid of tuition fees because we do not want higher education which depends on the wealth of the parents,” said Gabriele Heinen-Kjajic, Minister for Science and Culture in Lower Saxony, explaining the state’s decision.
Dorothee Stapelfeldt, a senator in the northern Hamburg Parliament, said she believes tuition fees are simply an “unjust” approach to education. “They discourage young people who do not have a traditional academic family background from taking up study. It is a core task of politics to ensure that young women and men can study with a high quality standard free of charge in Germany.”
The press in some countries – such as Canada and the U.K. – were quick to jump on the news as an opportunity to raise the question about possible free education systems in those nations as well.
It is also interesting to note that Germany’s free tuition policy goes for international students as well. So it remains to be seen whether the lastest publicity could spur a run on applications to German institutions by Americans and students elsewhere.
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