Some 300,000 people already living in Germany can profit from the new acknowledgement legislation. This law, for the first time, creates a legal claim to assessment of equivalence of foreign vocational qualifications with German qualifications for the 350 occupations requiring vocational training within the dual vocational training system.
In this past year, more than 515,800 young people took up a study course for the first time. For comparison: In 2005, there were 362,252 new students. This is an increase by more than 42 per cent. A university study course thus is as popular as never before. With the Higher Education Pact, the federal government and the federal states provide funding - at an equal share - for 335,000 additional university places by 2015.
Given the double number of secondary school graduates qualifying for university and the suspension of military or alternative civilian service, the pact received considerably more funds this year. In 2012, the federal states receive 1.1 billion Euro from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and for the period up until 2015 about five billion Euro for creating new university places.
186 universities and thus 77 per cent of all state-run universities were successful in the BMBF's "Quality Pact Teaching" programme and will receive until 2020 financial support for improving the conditions of studying and quality of teaching. A particular point of focus here is on projects offering support and orientation to students during their first few semesters, which is of crucial importance for the further course of their studies. Until 2020, the BMBF will invest two billion Euro in the "Quality Pact Teaching".
150,000 education bonuses have been awarded since 2008. With these, the BMBF supports people in gainful employment who wish to obtain continuing education. 74 per cent of beneficiaries are women, 89 per cent are employed in small and medium-sized enterprises, 15 per cent have a migration background. In the long term, this creates an awareness for the significance of continuing education and promotes individual initiative.
Across the country, 570,140 articles of apprenticeship were newly concluded between October 1, 2010 and September 30, 2011. This is an increase of 1.8 per cent compared to the previous year (560,073). Conversely, the number of external apprenticeship training agreements has significantly declined also in 2011. The conditions on the vocational training market are as good as they have not been in a long time.