THEY had such a nice time together, got along so well during the three weeks they spent that tears of grief rolled down their cheeks when they parted. “We wept all night,” said Sara on the last day in Germany. “We don’t want to leave.”
The 18-year-old from Florence, Italy, is one of 450 scholarship-holders from all over the world participating in one of eight youth courses staged by the Goethe-Institut this summer as part of the “Schools: Partners for the Future” initiative.
Together with young students of German language from Finland, Thailand, Indonesia and Mongolia, Sara spent three weeks in Vallendar near Koblenz taking part in an intensive course in German. She evidently found it all great fun. She wants to return and continue her German studies. Sara has new friends all across the world, whom she intends to send e-mails, in German.
And that is exactly how it should be. The partner school initiative, one of the latest cultural and educational initiatives launched this year by Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, is aimed at drawing the attention of the world youths towards modern-day Germany.
“It will create a global network of a thousand partner schools offering German language courses,” the foreign minister said.
The Goethe-Institut is working on this network in conjunction with the Central Agency for Schools Abroad (ZfA), the Educational Exchange Service (PAD) and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) — all of them cultural arms of the foreign office.
Cultural relations and education policy are considered the “third pillar of German foreign policy”, its mission is as wide-ranging as the cultural and educational landscape itself. And objectives range from spreading awareness of the German arts scene abroad to promoting the German language.
The Institute for Foreign Cultural Relations (ifa) also organizes worldwide touring exhibitions for noted German artists. ZfA too provides educational, personnel and financial support for more than a hundred German schools abroad. Today, mainly local students whose parents appreciate the high standard of schooling attend these schools. Some schools even run special programs for children whose parents cannot afford the school fees: the largest German school abroad, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, for example, offers a scholarship for children from poor families.
Graduates of German schools abroad have all the educational qualifications needed to study at a German university. Mahmoud Morsy from Egypt, for example, has just completed a degree in computer sciences at the TU Darmstadt. He was one of the top German school graduates of his year and was rewarded for that with a DAAD scholarship for the full duration of a course of undergraduate study in Germany. “A super opportunity,” the 25-year-old says, “the course offered in Darmstadt is great”.
Starting this year, there will be 120 of these attractive full scholarships available for students from German schools abroad — twice as many as in the past.
International scientific exchange takes place largely under the auspices of the DAAD and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (AvH). The DAAD provides scholarships for more than 35,000 foreign students, graduates, scientists and artists a year; the AvH grants around 600 research fellowships and awards a year to international academics.
Putting people from different countries and cultures in touch with Germany is a goal central to all the efforts of the 13 mediator organizations that implement cultural relations and education policy for the federal foreign office.
The idea is to forge bonds and create networks from which many people worldwide profit. The German-Arab media dialogue, for instance, which for the last 11 years has provided an annual forum for intense communication between journalists and publicists from Germany and the Arab world. The program has now been extended to include Islamic countries outside the Arab world and meetings have been held in Iran, Turkey, Pakistan and Central Asia.
This year, “Action Africa” was launched for cultural and educational relations with Africa aimed at connecting with the African youths.
In the context of cultural relations policy, Germany also engages in helping to preserve threatened cultural heritage sites in developing countries. In Afghanistan, it funds the documentation of archaeological sites, a task addressed by the German Archaeological Institute. In Iraq, the National Museum, the Antiquities Administration and other institutions receive support for the protection of archaeological excavations, such as those at the site of the ancient city of Babylon.
These are but a few examples of nearly 2,100 projects in 135 countries supported through the country’s cultural preservation program since 1981 at a cost of 40.7 million euros.
Culture, education and science can forge bonds between peoples more effectively than words. Germany has understood this well and in earnest, and it aims to take full use of this while forging relations, globally.
