It's not Vienna!
This is where our students have the greatest deficit in German
In Austria, one in nine elementary school children recently needed German language support. However, the highest proportion of children with German language deficits is not in Vienna (20), the only large city, but in several cities in Upper Austria. This is shown by an evaluation of Statistics Austria for the APA.
The highest proportion of elementary school children who had to attend a German support class or group due to problems with the language of instruction was recently over 25 percent in Wels. In Traun and Linz, there were also more "exceptional" pupils than in the federal capital in the 2024/25 school year, at 22 percent each, while in Steyr (19) and the provincial capitals of Salzburg and Graz (18 percent each), the proportion was slightly lower. In the provincial capitals of Sankt Pölten and Innsbruck, 16 percent of elementary school students were recently assessed as unlikely to be able to follow regular lessons without special support. In Villach and Bregenz, the figure was 13 percent.
Already born in Austria
The classification usually takes place at the start of school, which is why the vast majority of "exceptional" children are concentrated in the first grades of elementary school. Among first-graders and preschoolers in Vienna, half recently had "exceptional" status, with the majority having been born in Austria and attended kindergarten for several years.
Big differences in the details
In a five-year comparison, the proportion of "exceptional" children in all 19 cities with over 25,000 inhabitants has risen by several percentage points. The increase from 14 to 19 percent is greater in densely populated areas than in areas outside of metropolitan areas, based on the Austrian average. In absolute terms, Vienna has by far the most children with German language support needs (16,600) due to its size, while Linz had just under 1,900, Salzburg 1,000, and Wels and Innsbruck around 700.
Criticism of the test
There has been repeated criticism from academia and practitioners of the biannual MIKA-D test, which has been used to assign "exceptional" status since the introduction of mandatory separate German support classes in 2018/19. They argue that it is not suitable for determining whether the German language skills of children or young people who are new to the language are sufficient to follow lessons. Last year, a supplementary scale was finally introduced for those cases in which, according to MIKA-D, pupils narrowly missed promotion to the regular class.
Planned innovations
Further innovations have been announced for next fall to make the test more accurate. An enhanced version is planned, including additional questions for the 3rd and 4th grades of elementary school and middle school, i.e., for children who enter the Austrian school system at a later stage as lateral entrants.
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