Experiments with the First Youth Schools and Nine-Year Obligatory Schooling

The introduction of the youth school (ungdomsskole) was first suggested in 1952 by a commission (Samordningsnemnda) that had been put in place in 1947 to discuss the internal coordination of the education system (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 24ff). In the spring of 1954, the Ministry of Education, led by the social democrat Birger Bergersen, proposed the law on experiments in the school (lov om forsøk i skolen), which was passed after little debate in June 1954. The law did not contain any details on the future school structure. It simply opened up the possibility for experiments. It instituted the Experimental Council (Forskningsrådet), which was intended to coordinate school experiments in line with the law (Reference MediåsMediås, 2010, 43). It was stipulated that the council should inform parliament about the experiments regularly. The law gave the ministry decision-making power as far as all school experiments were concerned. Far-reaching competencies were transferred from parliament to the ministry (Reference SlagstadSlagstad, 2001, 379ff; Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 32).

Conservative Party representatives made some minor suggestions for changes, but when these failed the law was passed unanimously (Forhandlinger i Odelstinget, June 17, 1954, 173f; Forhandlinger i Lagtinget, June 22, 1954, 75ff). At the time, the Conservative Party had no clear education-political profile but was internally split. One of its leading education politicians, Erling Fredriksfryd, consented to the youth school reform. Fredriksfryd was a primary schoolteacher and a parliamentary representative of the Conservative Party from 1945 to 1965. From 1958 to 1965, he was chair of the parliamentary education committee. In 1957, he was chair of a commission within the Conservative Party that drafted the party’s education-political manifesto. The program he stood for was summarized in the Conservative Party’s electoral manifesto of 1957:

Later, Fredriksfryd published two brochures that explained the details (Reference FredriksfrydFredriksfryd, 1960, Reference Fredriksfryd1965). Notably, the lower-secondary school envisaged by Fredriksfryd was meant to replace the parallel school types of the realskole and the framhaldsskole. There was no consensus within the Conservative Party about this.

In 1955, the first three experimental youth schools with two internal tracks (linjedelt ungdomsskole) were founded in the municipalities of Malm (in the county of Nord-Trøndelag), Sykkylven, and Ørsta (in the county of Møre og Romsdal). In 1957, experiments began in seven more counties, in 1958 in another six, and in 1959 in the last twelve (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 36). The ninth school year was not obligatory, so many students in the experimental schools dropped out. The Experimental Council therefore suggested to parliament that experiments should be started with nine years of obligatory schooling (Reference MyhreMyhre, 1971, 113).

In the Labor Party’s manifesto for 1958–61, it was stated,

In line with this, the Ministry of Education proposed a new folkeskole law in 1958 (Ot. prp. nr. 30 [1958], Lov om folkeskolen). In contrast to the experimental law of 1954, this proposal caused a lot of debate and split the educational parliamentary committee and parliament itself. The law made it possible for municipalities to introduce nine years of obligatory schooling, after consultation with the local school board and the ministry. The most highly contested point was whether the old school types, realskole and framhaldsskole, should be allowed to participate in the experiments with nine-year obligatory schooling (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 55ff). The opposition parties, meaning the Conservative Party, the Christian Democrats, the Center Party, and the Liberal Party, wanted to include the old school types, but the Labor Party did not. The Labor Party had seven representatives on the parliamentary education committee, while the opposition parties had six. In the committee’s statement on the proposition (Innstilling fra kirke- og undervisningskomiteen om lov om folkeskolen, 1959), the division was expressed clearly. The Labor Party majority advocated nine-year comprehensive schooling without any reservations and wished for a final decision to be made.

The oppositional minority suggested that the municipalities themselves should choose whether to introduce nine-year obligatory schooling through the new youth school or the old school types. The debates on March 13, 1959, in the two chambers of the Norwegian parliament were lively (Forhandlinger i Lagtinget, March 13, 1959; Forhandlinger i Odelstinget, March 5, 1959). Labor Party representatives pointed to the weaknesses of the realskole, which they considered to be overcrowded and lead to exclusion, and of the framhaldsskole, which they considered to be lacking quality. They saw parallel schooling as “costly, irrational, and unfortunate in many ways,” especially in rural areas (Labor Party representative Anders Sæterøy, Forhandlinger i Lagtinget, March 13, 1959, 21). Trygve Bull, member of the parliamentary education committee for the Labor Party, expressed that, in the eyes of the Labor Party majority, the comprehensive principle itself was not to be subjected to experiments. Only the inner life of the school and its internal differentiation, pedagogy, and so forth should be developed further through experimental activity. Bull said,

Clearly, the Labor Party cannot be accused of making a secret of its ambitions. The aim was to exclude any possibility of survival for the old school types. This was justified by the necessity to create equal educational opportunities, independent of economic, social, and geographical background. The ambition to overcome the parallel lower-secondary-school system was rooted in the conviction that it was necessary to achieve social levelling and break down educational middle- and upper-class and urban privileges. Such privileges had not been very exclusive in Norway to start with, but they were real (Reference Aubert, Torgersen, Tangen, Lindbekk and PollanAubert et al., 1960). The old school types were associated with different degrees of status and attended by students with different class backgrounds (Reference LindbekkLindbekk, 1968, Reference Lindbekk1973, 88ff; Innstilling frå Folkeskolekomitéen av 1963 [1965], 129). This inequality was unacceptable in the eyes of the Labor Party. In the words of the Labor Party politician Gudmund Hernes,

Besides Fredriksfryd, there were two other conservative politicians on the parliamentary education committee at the time of the debates about the law of 1959: Per Lønning and Hartvig Caspar Christie. Christie was parliamentary representative of the Conservative Party from 1950 to 1959 and Lønning from 1958 to 1965. According to Lønning, Christie “represented the absolute oppositional extreme” compared to Fredriksfryd, and, as a result, “one noticed rather quickly that there developed a certain opposition within the conservative group of the committee” (expert interview). When the conservative parliamentary group prepared the parliamentary debate about the new folkeskole law, it was decided that Lønning should be the speaker for the party on this issue. Lønning described this in the following way:

In the debates of 1959, Lønning and especially Christie showed skepticism of the comprehensive principle. Christie stated that the term “comprehensive school” (enhetsskole) had become “a propagandistic buzzword which is therefore little suited for a school program” (Forhandlinger i Odelstinget, March 5, 1959, 46). In his opinion, the realskole had been a good school that could not be blamed for its overcrowding by people who did not belong there. Instead, the alternative schools – meaning the framhaldsskole – had not been good enough and needed to be improved, not abolished. Lønning suggested that there had to be room for future school structures that differed from the “dogmatic comprehensive school scheme” of the Labor Party and warned that the danger lay in “overemphasizing unity and thereby elevating the holy general average to the main norm” (Forhandlinger i Odelstinget, March 5, 1959, 14f). Differentiation in the youth school was essential in his eyes. Nonetheless, Lønning stated,

In the expert interview, Lønning explained that he supported the tracked youth school because he believed that “tracking could point towards a type of differentiation where the intellectual, […] theoretical track’s advantage is underlined anew.” Presumably for this reason, Lønning supported Fredriksfryd in adding a special remark to the parliamentary education committee’s report regarding the law. Here, the two of them indicated that they expected the tracked comprehensive school to become “the school type on which it will […] be advisable to build obligatory primary education” in the future but that they thought that for the time being it should also be permissible to experiment based on the old school types (lnnst. O. II. (1959), 11). Christie did not support this remark. In contrast to Christie’s and Lønning’s antagonism, Fredriksfryd underlined the many agreements between all committee members in the parliamentary debate and pointed out that, in his view, disagreements were merely a matter of nuances (Forhandlinger i Odelstinget, March 5, 1959, 61).

The Center Party’s representatives, the Liberals, and the Christian Democrats voted with the Conservative Party against the folkeskole law of 1959, but the reasons for their skepticism were different from the Conservative Party’s. For example, the Center Party representative Inge Einarsen Bartnes stated in the parliamentary debate that the main reason for his “mixed feelings” was his worry about whether there would be sufficient financial means for rural municipalities to execute the provisions of the law (Forhandlinger i Lagtinget, March 13, 1959, 9). The Christian Democratic representative Erling Wikborg agreed that those municipalities with the worst financial conditions had to “come first in line” but also pointed out that one of the things about this reform that appealed to him most was that “we shall achieve greater equality at the outset.” In fact, he considered it “an unquestionable advantage that one, for so many years, will attend school with other youths who have completely different preconditions than oneself” (Forhandlinger i Lagtinget, March 13, 1959, 18).

The Liberal Party representative Sivert Todal specified that comprehensive schooling in grades eight and nine should be introduced more “gradually” so that the municipalities that had not even managed to comply with the folkeskole law of 1936 would have sufficient time and flexibility during a “transitional period” (Forhandlinger i Lagtinget, March 13, 1959, 16). His fellow party member Bert Røiseland warned against forcing municipalities to teach all tracks in the same building, as this could lead to “forced centralization” (Forhandlinger i Lagtinget, March 13, 1959, 26). According to the interviewed expert Hans Olav Tungesvik, there was a certain “nostalgia” within the center parties regarding the abolition of the realskole, since this school type had produced such good results in some places. However, many rural municipalities did not have realskoler. Even where they did exist, only a small percentage of rural age cohorts attended them. The main worry of the center parties was thus not the abolition of the realskole; rather, they worried whether rural municipalities would have sufficient means and flexibility to manage the transition to nine-year obligatory schooling.

The opposition was supported in its skepticism by the Association of Norwegian Secondary Schoolteachers. In 1956, the association’s yearly convention passed a statement against the abolition of the realskole and warned against any lowering of the realskole’s standard (Reference HagemannHagemann, 1992, 265; Reference MarmøyMarmøy, 1968, 49ff). In 1959, the association complained about not having been heard during the preparation of the folkeskole law and asked for the law proposal to be withdrawn (Reference MarmøyMarmøy, 1968, 56ff; Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 53). The secondary schoolteachers argued that the law proposal was not well prepared, that it anticipated the results of unfinished experiments, and that the powers it gave the ministry were too extensive (Reference MarmøyMarmøy, 1968, 59). There had been no commission to prepare the law, as had been usual earlier (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 53f). Within the organization, the reforms were also critically discussed on the local level, where antagonistic voices could be heard in many places (Reference MarmøyMarmøy, 1968, 54ff).

The Female Teachers’ Association was also skeptical of the law of 1959, however for somewhat different reasons. Female teachers supported prolonged obligatory schooling but opposed the abolition of the framhaldsskole. They were worried that education in homemaking would lose ground. Many of them did not have the necessary educational qualifications to teach in more academic lower-secondary schools, so the reform potentially threatened their jobs (Reference HagemannHagemann, 1992, 270ff). The small association of framhaldsskole teachers opposed a merger of the old school types for similar reasons. However, many framhaldsskole teachers and female teachers were instead organized in the largest teachers’ association, the Norwegian Teachers’ Association. Representatives of the Norwegian Teachers’ Association had been more involved in the preparation of the law than the other teachers’ organizations, as they had good personal contacts with the leaders of the Experimental Council and the ministry. They agreed with the Labor Party’s ideological justifications of the reform but also profited from it structurally since the youth school was to become a part of the obligatory primary school. This opened up job opportunities for primary schoolteachers. For these reasons, they supported the reform wholeheartedly (Reference HagemannHagemann, 1992, 251ff).

Despite the opposition’s caveats, the law was passed by the Labor Party’s majority. From this point on, any municipality that wanted to introduce nine-year obligatory schooling had to do so by introducing the youth school as a new school type. Usually, the youth school would last three years, and the folkeskole would therefore be shortened to six years, but a seven-year folkeskole and a two-year youth school were also possible. Municipalities that already had realskoler could introduce a nonobligatory tenth school year.

Experiments with Reduced Organizational Differentiation

To begin with, the youth school was divided into vocational and academic tracks resembling the older school types. The tracks began in the second year of the youth school and were distinguished in the beginning mainly by whether learning a foreign language was obligatory. During the last year, the students following the practical track had fewer hours of mathematics, social sciences, and natural sciences and instead could choose from the subjects shop-floor work, homemaking, office work, agriculture, or fishing and seafaring (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 68). The experimental curriculum from 1960 included ability grouping through kursplaner (course plans). There were three ability levels in Norwegian, mathematics, and English, while there were two in German and natural sciences. The curriculum designed by the Experimental Council suggested ability grouping from the first year of the youth school, the seventh grade – in other words, at an earlier point than had been usual in the old seven-year folkeskole. In a parliamentary debate on June 8, 1961, it became clear that the parliamentary majority did not want this. The Labor Party representatives, but also the representatives of the center parties, thought that there should be no ability grouping in the first year of the youth school and tracking should generally be more flexible.

Again, one of the arguments used by the center parties, for example by Center Party representative Einar Hovdhaugen, was that later differentiation in the new youth school would allow greater “elasticity” for rural municipalities (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, June 8, 1961, 3479). Hovdhaugen also warned that “it would be a disaster if one’s IQ should be a criterion for the choice of track” and suggested that experiments with ability grouping should be expanded to overcome the problems with current forms of differentiation. It was important to the Center Party that differentiation would not produce “losers” and lead to student apathy (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, June 8, 1961, 3480). The Christian Democrat Hans Karolus Ommedal expressed his concerns that ability grouping might lead to disorder in the school and pointed to the small rural schools as good examples of how the common teaching of all students in the classroom could be accomplished (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, June 8, 1961, 3487).

The Conservative Party alone had not taken a position for or against tracking and ability grouping in the seventh grade and wanted experiments with different models of tracking to continue, arguing that it was necessary to adapt schooling to individuals’ abilities (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, June 8, 1961). For this, they were mocked by the Labor Party politician Håkon Johnsen, secretary of the parliamentary education committee. He complained that the Conservative Party’s school manifesto of 1957 had not included tracking in the seventh school year. Johnsen pointed out that, in 1957, Fredriksfryd had been responsible for the development of the Conservative Party’s education-political manifesto:

Over fifty years later, Lønning mentioned this remark in the expert interview as an example of how the Labor Party attempted to split the opposition parties. Fredriksfryd was not happy about the situation, nor did he give up his stand on the nine-year comprehensive school. But antagonistic voices were slowly becoming louder within the Conservative Party.

Experiments with different curricula, tracking, the introduction of a tenth grade, and ability grouping continued (Reference Seidenfaden, Körner and SeidenfadenSeidenfaden, 1977, 18ff). From 1962, students were assessed in relation to their ability group. This meant that the same grades from different ability groups were not worth the same. In 1963, the folkeskole committee was set up to work on a law proposal that would end the experimental phase of the introduction of the youth school (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 122). In June 1965, the committee presented a report in which it had drafted reasons for and against various forms of differentiation and evaluation (Innstilling frå Folkeskolekomitéen av 1963 [1965]; Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 122ff). One aspect was the question of which combinations of tracks, course plans, and subjects would be necessary to qualify for upper-secondary schooling at the gymnas. These schools had introduced the requirement that students had to have attended the highest ability groups in Norwegian, English, German, and mathematics (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 87ff).

The Experimental Council published several revised versions of the experimental curriculum from 1960. These were known as the blue plan (1963), the red plan (1964), and the green plan (1965). In these plans, organizational differentiation was decreased. In the blue plan, tracking was abolished. The number of obligatory, common subjects for all students rose. Differentiation was now more flexible and based on different choices of elective subjects. It was made possible for all students, no matter what their elective subjects, to choose the highest ability groups in mathematics, English, and Norwegian (Reference MyhreMyhre, 1971, 119; Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 91ff). In the red plan and the green plan, the number of obligatory subjects was increased further (Reference MyhreMyhre, 1971, 120f). In 1965, the Experimental Council started experimenting with mixed-ability classes (sammenholdte klasser, literally “kept-together classes”) in Norwegian and, from 1968, in mathematics. This was justified by studies showing that students in different ability groups did not always differ much in ability. The best students in the lowest ability groups were often better than the worst students in the highest group. The groups were not homogenous (Reference DokkaDokka, 1986, 119ff; Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 118). The trend was one toward diminishing organizational differentiation and instead using pedagogical differentiation within the classroom.

The Labor Party, the Socialist People’s Party, and the center parties supported this development, as became clear in the parliamentary debates of 1963, 1965, and 1969 (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 21, 1963; Forhandlinger i Stortinget, June 8, 1965; Forhandlinger i Stortinget, April 21, 1969; Reference TelhaugTelhaug 1969, 101ff). In the eyes of the Labor Party and the Socialist People’s Party, the problem with ability grouping was that it reproduced the social inequalities that had characterized the old school types. Children from the upper and middle classes were overrepresented in the higher ability groups (Reference LindbekkLindbekk, 1968, Reference Lindbekk1973; Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 143f). The fear was that ability grouping led to a stigmatization of the students in the lowest ability groups. For example, the Socialist People’s Party stated in its manifesto of 1965,

For the Labor Party, the abolition of organizational differentiation in the youth school was also connected to the aim of increasing the status of practical and vocational education. In its manifesto for 1966–9, the Labor Party stated for example that “practical and theoretical education must be deemed to be of equal value” and that “[t]he school system must not create social divisions as a result of differences in education.”

The center parties did not include any remarks on tracking or ability grouping in their manifestos. The details of differentiation within the school were not a priority for these parties. Most small rural schools did not have enough students to implement ability grouping anyway (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 143). However, in parliamentary debates the center parties voiced criticism. The Liberal Party representative Torkell Tende pointed out that tracking had meant “only the choice of framhaldsskole-realskole in a new version”; to him it seemed advisable to keep classes together, even after the seventh school year, with the help of an individual “differentiation in pace” (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 21, 1963, 3350). The center parties’ representatives disliked the fact that grades in the different ability groups were not worth the same and that this created unfairness with respect to upper-secondary schooling. They also considered ability groups to have a stigmatizing effect. As Center Party representative Einar Hovdhaugen put it,

However, the representatives of the center parties used most of their speaking time during the various parliamentary debates on education during the 1960s to address other issues closer to their hearts (see Chapter 5). They had accepted the fact that the new school type would replace the old parallel school types and rarely referred to earlier disagreements on this issue.

By 1963, the Conservative Party had given up its adherence to tracking, which was now considered to be out of date. Instead, the conservatives suggested expanding experiments with ability grouping. As Per Lønning stated in the parliamentary debate of May 1963, the abolition of tracking should not lead to the abolition of all differentiation (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 21, 1963, 3312ff; Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 101ff). In its manifestos, the Conservative Party made more detailed suggestions than the center parties regarding the development of schooling and differentiation. In 1965, the manifesto stated that the great pressure on schools “must not lead to a lowering of standards.” The manifesto also warned that some duties could only be fulfilled by the home and that one must avoid “creating ideas about society taking over the home’s responsibilities.” It stated that differentiation was necessary and that experiments with various forms of differentiation should be expanded to overcome problems with the current system. In 1969, similar formulations, including a reference to the realskole, were included:

The Regularization of the Youth School

From 1965 to 1971, the four “nonsocialist parties” – the Conservative Party, the Center Party, the Liberal Party, and the Christian Democrats – governed, with Per Borten from the Center Party as prime minister. The youth school reform proposal, which the folkeskole committee had been preparing since 1963, was followed up. In the spring of 1967, the minister of education, Kjell Bondevik, a Christian democrat, presented the law proposal on the nine-year comprehensive school (Ot. prp. nr. 59 [1966–7] Lov om grunnskolen). The minister himself was of the opinion that “one would not have received a strongly differing proposal from another government” (quoted in Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 129). The law ended the experimental phase and regularized the new school type, the youth school. The term folkeskole (people’s school) was replaced by the more modern term grunnskole (primary school), which comprised both the barneskole (children’s school) and the ungdomsskole (youth school). The law obligated all municipalities to introduce the youth school by 1975 (Reference MediåsMediås, 2010, 45).

In April 1969, the law was passed. The only two representatives who voted against the law were from the Socialist People’s Party. Spokesperson Finn Gustavsen considered the Norwegian school to be too centralized, not democratic enough, and too strongly based on exams. In his view, schools supported a “competition and career mentality” (Forhandliger i Stortinget, April 21, 1969, 288). He also did not support the strong focus on Christian education. The first paragraph of the law (formålsparagrafen) had been a source of massive conflict revolving around the relations between church, parents, and the school. In the end, a compromise was reached that was supported by all parties, except the socialists (Reference TønnessenTønnessen, 2011, 72f; see Chapter 5).

This outcome was not what the Association of Norwegian Secondary Schoolteachers had wished for. As indicated by a survey among 1153 gymnas teachers in 1969, the introduction of the youth school was hard to accept for many of them. Over 40 percent of the interviewed teachers agreed fully or mostly with the statement that “the decision to introduce the nine-year school was taken because the many people who disagreed, mostly did not dare to publicly oppose the political buzzwords which were used” (Reference LaugloLauglo, 1972, 9). Almost 70 percent of the interviewed gymnas teachers agreed fully or mostly that nine years of obligatory schooling were too much, and 57 percent agreed fully or mostly that the old school forms of the framhaldsskole and realskole should have been expanded instead of introducing the youth school (Reference LaugloLauglo, 1972, 10). However, the secondary schoolteachers adapted to the conditions and did not organize opposition when the law of 1969 was passed.

The law did not offer any solution to the problems of differentiation, ability grouping, and evaluation. The question of differentiation was avoided. The ministry was hesitant (Reference TelhaugTelhaug, 1969, 129). Kjeld Langeland, representative of the Conservative Party, explained in the parliamentary debate that it was still too early to make a decision. Experiments had not come far enough (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, April 21, 1969, 256).

There are a few indications that the center parties were more open to the abolition of ability grouping than the Conservative Party. For example, the Liberal Party representative Olav Kortner criticized the Conservative Party’s representative Kjeld Langeland for his choice of words. Langeland had spoken of “so-called social reasons” in relation to parents’ choice of ability group. Kortner did not like the tone of this. His opinion was that ability grouping was creating “considerable social problems” and that it was necessary to “intensify experiments […] to find more socially beneficial forms [of differentiation], for example forms of mixed-ability classes” (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, April 21, 1969, 262).

In the interviews, the experts who had been active in the center parties at the time were asked why their parties did not attempt to reverse the comprehensive school reforms when in government but instead continued on the path that had been laid out by the Labor Party. To this, Hans Olav Tungesvik – then a member of the Liberal Party and later a member of the Christian Democrats – replied,

Other experts, such as the Christian Democrat Jakob Aano agreed that the conservative/center parties’ government of 1965–71 was mostly a time of continuity in education politics. The Christian Democratic minister of education Kjell Bondevik supported the introduction of the youth school. Apart from the law on private schooling that was passed under his leadership (see Chapter 5), he had no interest in any far-reaching changes of the school structure.

A new committee was appointed, Normalplanutvalget, with the pedagogue Hans-Jørgen Dokka as chair. This committee had to discuss the question of differentiation again and found itself in a “painful dilemma” (Reference Telhaug and MediåsTelhaug/Mediås, 2003, 234). In its reports from 1970, the abolition of ability groups was suggested. It was said that the focus had to lie more on the individual student and that group homogenization would not solve the problem. However, mixed-ability classes depended on smaller class sizes, new teaching material, and the possibility of dividing students up in groups more flexibly (Reference DokkaDokka, 1986, 119ff).

In 1971, the non-leftist government collapsed because of internal disagreement about membership of the European Community. While the Conservative Party supported membership, the Center Party was against, and the Liberal Party and the Christian Democrats were split. The Labor Party again took over government. In April 1972, the Labor Party’s Congress and the Norwegian Federation of Trade Unions decided to support membership. However, 53.5 percent of the voters voted against membership in a referendum in September 1972. The Labor Party government left office. From 1972 to 1973, the center parties created a short-lived government, followed by new Labor Party governments from 1973 to 1981.

The Grading Debate

During the 1970s, the opposition between the social democrats and conservatives became more pronounced. Lars Roar Langslet, chair of the parliamentary education committee from 1973 to 1980 and parliamentary representative of the Conservative Party from 1969 to 1989, described the development over time:

One of the issues Langslet refers to here was the debate on grading. Grades in the first three years of the folkeskole had been abolished already in the curriculum of 1939, and from 1962, grades in the fourth grade were abolished (Reference Tønnessen, Telhaug, Skagen and TillerTønnessen/Telhaug, 1996, 23; St. meld. nr. 42 [1964–5], 15f). In the Labor Party’s manifestos, it was stated on several occasions from 1969 onward that the nine-year comprehensive school should be “free of exams.” In September 1972, the Ministry of Education appointed an Evaluation Committee (Evalueringsutvalget for skoleverket) to examine all questions related to the evaluation of students. A united parliamentary education committee agreed to the appointment of the Evaluation Committee, stating that “today’s regulation with final exams and grades based on the achieved results has inherent weaknesses” (Innst. S. nr. 287 [1971–2], 548). It was said that grading provided little motivation for the weakest students and that it could lead to an overly strong focus on achieving good exam results. In the same year, grades were abolished throughout the six-year children’s school (Reference MediåsMediås, 2010, 46; Reference MyhreMyhre, 1971, 140). This did not lead to much debate. Many supporters of the reforms, such as the members of the Primary School Committee, the Experimental Council, and education politicians within the Labor Party, anticipated that the next step would be to abolish grades in the youth school.

On February 26, 1974, the ministry, led by the Labor politician Bjartmar Gjerde, issued regulations that restricted grades in the youth school to Norwegian, English, and mathematics. This led to protests. Many parents, students, and teachers were against the regulations. In April, the Conservative Party, the Christian Democrats, the Center Party, and even the Socialist Electoral Alliance issued statements asserting that the regulations should be withdrawn and that no regulations should be issued before the reports of the Evaluation Committee had been published (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 8, 1974, 3126).

On May 8, 1974, the regulations were debated in parliament. In this debate, several of the Labor Party’s representatives attacked the grading system (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 8, 1974, 3120ff). It was pointed out that grading destroyed students’ motivation for learning and that it was unfair to judge students not based on their effort but based on their varying preconditions. Grades did not convey a nuanced picture of students’ abilities and effort but led to an overly high focus on simple and inadequate measurements. The same performance could be graded differently depending on the composition of the class, since the students’ performances were compared with each other, not with their earlier personal achievements. This meant to these Labor representatives that whether a student would be admitted to upper-secondary schooling was to a high degree the result of luck, with major repercussions for students’ lives. Grading was harmful with respect to the aim that students should feel safe and respected at school. The Labor Party politician Einar Førde summarized his position the following way:

The conservative speakers made it clear that their party was opposed to any reductions in grading. On this issue, they were more united than in the debate about the structural reforms. Lars Roar Langslet expressed the conservative position:

Like Lønning, who had argued against the abolition of grading in the folkeskole in the 1960s (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, June 8, 1961, 3474; Forhandlinger i Stortinget, June 8, 1965, 3697f), Langslet argued that written evaluations could lead to more arbitrariness than grades (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 8, 1974, 3126).

The center parties consented to the abolition of grading in the children’s school but stood closer to the Conservative Party than to the Labor Party regarding the question of grading in the youth school. The Center Party representative Ola O. Røssum declared that “the school must not needlessly contribute to and strengthen career chasing and demands for achievement” and that it was therefore sensible to have abolished grades in the children’s school (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 8, 1974, 3120ff). But he deemed it impossible to abolish grades in the youth school as long as upper-secondary schooling had not been expanded sufficiently to grant access to everyone. The Christian democrat Kjell Magne Bondevik agreed that while the intention might have been good, the regulations were “a pedagogical and political mistake.” Like Røssum, he thought that the abolition of grades in the children’s school had been sensible but that selection for upper-secondary schooling necessitated grading in the youth school. “Nuanced evaluations” could possibly be added to or replace grades at some future point, “when there is a basis for it.” He reacted strongly to the accusations of the Labor Party that had been calling opposition to the reduction of grading an expression of “conservative currents in the population.” He did not want to be identified with the label “conservative” and thought that the Labor Party was flattering itself by labeling the reduction of grading “a radical reform” (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 8, 1974, 3128f). The Liberal Party representative Hans Hammond Rossbach, a secondary schoolteacher, agreed that abolishing grades in the youth school was a bad idea since the necessary conditions for such a step were not met. He pointed out that both the students’ and the teachers’ associations were opposed to the new regulations (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 8, 1974, 3134).

He thus pointed to a difficulty for the Labor Party. Not surprisingly, the Association of Norwegian Secondary Schoolteachers was critical of the abolition of grades. However, as was lamented by several of the Labor Party’s speakers, the Norwegian Teachers’ Association could also not be depended on regarding this question. In earlier statements, the organization had suggested that grading in the youth school should be reduced to the subjects of Norwegian, mathematics, and English and had supported the reduction of grades to a minimum. But in March 1974, the primary schoolteachers sent a letter to the ministry complaining that they had not been heard and stating that they opposed the reduction of grading (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 8, 1974, 3135). Internally, they were split on the issue. As Kari Lie, at this point secretary of the Norwegian Teachers’ Association and formerly active in the Female Teachers’ Association, stated, “There were several people on the national board who thought I was hopeless for wanting to keep grades in the system” (expert interview). According to Lie, one reason for this disagreement was that many primary schoolteachers were not as radical as the progressive pedagogues who supported the abolition of grading. Like herself, some found it difficult to produce written evaluations of students’ achievements and thought that such evaluations could be more harmful than a bad grade.

Furthermore, even the Labor Party itself was internally split on the issue, as was confirmed by several of the interviewed experts. In his book, Reference LangsletLangslet (1977, 47) quotes a Gallup poll, according to which 89 percent of Labor Party members supported grades in the youth school, against only 9 percent who wanted them abolished. In the expert interview, he added that during this phase he had met “central people in the Labor Party who were quite crestfallen about how these school reformers had harried [them]” (expert interview).

Despite all this, the majority of the Evaluation Committee concluded in its first report in 1974 that grades should be abolished in the youth school (NOU 1974: 42 (1974) Karakterer, eksamen, kompetanse m.v. i skoleverket, Eva I). The minority agreed with abolishing grades in the children’s school but thought that youth school students should be given grades if they wanted them. Another minority even wanted to abolish grades in upper-secondary schools (NOU 1974: 42 [1974] Karakterer, eksamen, kompetanse m.v. i skoleverket, Eva I). In its second report from 1978, the committee suggested that entry to the gymnas should become independent of grades (NOU 1978: 2 [1978] Vurdering, kompetanse og inntak i skoleverket, Eva II). These reports created much debate. Over 2600 comments were sent in during the hearing. Two-thirds of those were negative about abolishing grades in the youth school (Reference TønnessenTønnessen, 2011, 79ff; Reference Tønnessen, Telhaug, Skagen and TillerTønnessen/Telhaug, 1996, 26). The Norwegian Teachers’ Association disagreed with the committee’s proposals, even though they showed a willingness to discuss the grading system based on further research (Reference Tønnessen, Telhaug, Skagen and TillerTønnessen/Telhaug, 1996, 28).

As a result of the massive opposition even within the Labor Party’s own ranks, the Labor Party minister Bjartmar Gjerde decided to backpedal. After the debate of May 9, 1974, he had already repealed the regulations on the reduction of grading. The socialist school reformer and primary schoolteacher Kjell Horn described the change of course as follows:

The Final Debate on Differentiation

The debates on differentiation in the youth school also became more polarized during the 1970s. The Conservative Party became more clearly antagonistic, but on this matter the Labor Party asserted itself. In 1972, the entire parliamentary committee had agreed with the suggestion of the Normalplanutvalget, of the Primary School Committee, and of the Labor Party–led ministry to abolish the current ability-group system, which was producing inequality of opportunity in the eyes of almost everyone (Innst. S. nr. 287 [1971–2]). This decision came into effect in 1975 with the new curriculum (Mønsterplanen for grunnskolen, M74). The parliamentary committee’s statement of 1972 also contained the following sentences:

In 1973, the manifesto of the Conservative Party asserted that the individual school should have responsibility for choosing the best form of differentiation. The conservative manifesto of 1977 opposed mixed-ability classes:

Lars Roar Reference LangsletLangslet’s (1977) book serves to illustrate the growing conservative antagonism. In the book, Langslet did not question the nine-year comprehensive school as such and showed some sympathy for the aim of developing a spirit of community between all youths, independent of social background. But he also wrote,

He did not support special schools for especially able children, which could “justly be branded as an attempt to create ‘apartheid’ in the school” (Reference LangsletLangslet, 1977, 62). Nonetheless, he claimed that the ablest students had been neglected by social democratic school reforms and that social democrats had no respect for inequalities but instead aimed exclusively at erasing or hiding them (Reference LangsletLangslet, 1977, 34ff, 61f). He also pointed out that, while much could be done to give disadvantaged children better chances, political measures “can under no circumstances go so far that all important inequalities disappear” (Reference LangsletLangslet, 1977, 39). This “pessimistic insight” was hard for socialist education politicians to accept (Reference LangsletLangslet, 1977, 39). He made the further accusation that to the socialists, “competition in itself [was] an evil which mirrors the basic inhumanity of the capitalist system” (Reference LangsletLangslet, 1977, 40).

In the interview, Langslet dubbed social democratic education politics “a sentimental school ideology,” aimed at turning the school into a counterpart of the “abominable capitalist society outside, where demands for performance at work are made and where there is competition and all kinds of ugliness” (expert interview). By way of comparison, the socialist politician Theo Koritzinsky pointed out that competition and hierarchies were important mechanisms for conservatives. Even though they would never have said that they supported differentiation with the aim of reproducing class differences, “they know full well that this is what can happen … and for them it’s not a problem; that’s how it is; that’s life; that’s how we are made” (expert interview).

In May 1979, these oppositions became visible in the final parliamentary debate on permanent ability grouping. The exact rules regarding organizational differentiation had been unclear since 1972 (Stortingstidende [1976–7], 2100 f; Stortingstidende [1977–8], 2694ff). For this reason, the Ministry of Education issued new regulations stating more clearly that permanent ability grouping throughout the course of a whole year was not allowed. Grouping students was only allowed on a short-term basis (St. meld. nr. 34 [1978–9], 11).

In the debate on these regulations, the Conservative Party’s representatives criticized the Labor Party’s “equality ideology” in harsh words. The conservative politician Håkon Randal, a member of the parliamentary education committee, thought that the abolition of ability grouping would lead to a “lowering of standards” and that it violated the school law (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 11, 1979, 3360). His fellow party member Tore Austad considered it a “great and very deplorable step backwards” to make ability grouping throughout a school year unlawful (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 11, 1979, 3367). Another conservative member of the parliamentary education committee, Karen Sogn, complained about the Labor Party’s “hysterical reaction” to the Conservative Party’s support for more far-reaching organizational differentiation. She quoted the Labor Party politician Reiulf Steen, who had accused the conservatives of supporting “apartheid in the school” and of working for an “elite school.” This, to her, was proof that the Labor Party was elevating “ideological considerations” above what was best for the individual student (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 11, 1979, 3373f). The conservatives also demanded that the Experimental Council be abolished, that structural reforms end, and that the focus should now be on improving the quality of teaching by introducing stricter demands regarding the content of schooling (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, April 17, 1975; Forhandlinger i Stortinget, April 20, 1978; Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 11, 1979; Reference LangsletLangslet, 1977).

The Christian Democrats and the Center Party sided with the Conservative Party against the new regulations (Innst. S. nr. 215 [1978–9]). Even though the Center Party and Christian Democrats had agreed in the 1960s and early 1970s that the ability-group system was unfair, they now defended local schools’ freedom with respect to organizational differentiation, including ability grouping. The Christian Democrat Olav Djupvik attacked the Labor Party for turning pedagogical questions into “ideological questions” in accordance with its “misunderstood equality ideology”:

To this, the Labor Party representative Kirsti Grøndahl replied,

Clearly, there was little sympathy between the Christian Democrats and the Labor Party at this point. However, the debate was dominated primarily by the antagonism between the Labor Party and the Conservative Party, whereas most representatives of the center parties did not choose equally strong words. The Center Party representative Leiv Blakset pointed out that he would like to “strongly underline” that it was right to focus on creating the best conditions, especially “for the weakest students,” though this should not mean neglecting the most able (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 11, 1979, 3368). His fellow party member Johan Syrstad regretted that the debate had been dominated by “buzzwords” and that the participants had “gone into the trenches.” He also thought that the Labor Party’s position was not so far removed from his own, since they agreed on the most important point: to give “considerable local freedom to the individual school.” He thought that it was a better idea to “let those who deal with the problems of daily life” make the decisions, instead of introducing “new, centrally issued regulations” (Forhandlinger i Stortinget, May 11, 1979, 3381). In other words, for the Center Party it was mostly a matter of principle to oppose central regulations.

The Liberal Party was weak at the time and not represented on the parliamentary education committee. The Liberal Party representative Odd Einar Dørum made it clear that his party sympathized more with the point of view of the Labor Party, even though he thought it difficult to detect “great oppositions” in the parliamentary committee’s report:

Dørum thus pointed to a difficulty faced by the opponents of the new regulations. It was hard to argue for organizational differentiation against the accusations of the Labor Party and the Socialist Left Party that one wanted to reintroduce the ability-group system through the back door. This system had become utterly unpopular. The directives were eventually passed by the parliamentary majority of the Labor Party and the Socialist Left Party. Due to this decision, a long-term development from parallel school types to tracked lower-secondary schooling, to ability grouping, and finally to the abolition of all organizational differentiation came to an end.

When the conservatives regained power in 1981, they abolished the Experimental Council and changed curricula. However, they did not attempt any far-reaching reversal of the structural reforms. According to Langslet, the main reason for this was “that one was fed up with reforms” and that the school now deserved “a quieter period where one should instead make the best out of the existing system.” Furthermore, he pointed out that “we weren’t a majority government, so we had to take into consideration whether this could receive support in parliament and such a total reversal would presumably have been a utopian project” (expert interview).

It would be wrong to say that changes came to a complete halt at this point. The regulations of the 1980s focused on the content of schooling more than on the outer structure of the system. During the 1990s, the comprehensive reform ideas were taken up again by the Labor Party’s minister of education, Gudmund Hernes. Under Hernes’ leadership, the age of school enrolment was lowered from seven to six years, thereby extending the children’s school to seven years again and comprehensive education to ten years. Upper-secondary education was also reformed further. However, at this point, the historical narrative of this chapter comes to a close. The final words shall be given to the Labor Party representative Einar Førde, minister of education from October 1979 to October 1981, who pointed out the following in the final parliamentary debate on organizational differentiation in May 1979:

Early Debates on Comprehensive and Nine-Year Obligatory Schooling

In NRW, the initial postwar years were a time of restoration. In education politics, the main conflict was about denominational schooling (see Chapter 5). In 1959, the German Committee for the Education and School System (Deutscher Ausschuss für das Erziehungs- und Bildungswesen) published its “framework plan for the remodeling and standardization of the general school system” (Rahmenplan zur Umgestaltung und Vereinheitlichung des allgemeinbildenden Schulwesens). This document suggested the upgrading of the upper grades of the Volksschule, termed Hauptschule in the document, by introducing a ninth and later tenth school year, an obligatory foreign language, and ability grouping in important subjects. It also suggested the introduction of a two-year transition or orientation stage after the first four years of schooling in the lower Volksschule, termed Grundschule. Grades five and six should serve to prolong the period of decision-making for one of the secondary school types. The SPD, the FDP, and the different organizations of Volksschule teachers supported these suggestions, while the CDU was hesitant (Reference Herrlitz, Hopf and TitzeHerrlitz et al., 2009, 168).

The Godesberg manifesto of the SPD from 1959 stated that “all privileges in access to educational institutions must be eliminated” and that “for any able person the way to secondary schools and educational institutions must be open.” It also demanded ten years of obligatory schooling. In its manifesto for the federal state elections in NRW in 1962, the SPD stated,

The manifesto informed voters that the NRW SPD had passed a motion in 1959 in response to the “framework plan.” They had suggested the introduction of an “orientation stage” for all children in grades five and six that would prepare them for the school type they would attend from grade seven. It was argued that this could prevent a “draining” of the Volksschule and an overcrowding of secondary schools “with students who are unfit for scientific work.” Extending comprehensive schooling by two years was thus presented as a measure that would strengthen selection at a later point.

In 1960, the Education and Science Workers’ Union published its “Bremen Plan” (Bremer Plan), in which it suggested an extension of comprehensive schooling by two years. From grades seven to ten, schooling should be organized in three tracks. This was justified as follows:

The Bremen Plan led to fierce reactions from the CDU and the Catholic Church because it also envisaged a secularization of the school system. The plan was said to be indistinguishable from the communist school program of the German Democratic Republic (Reference KopitzschKopitzsch, 1983, 190). It led to controversial debates within the union and soon disappeared from the agenda. In the following years, the union’s national chair, Heinrich Rodenstein, preferred to speak of “educational centers” in which traditional school types should be combined to increase permeability (Reference KopitzschKopitzsch, 1983, 230).

In the early 1960s, education debates accelerated, and Georg Reference PichtPicht (1964) coined the phrase “the German educational catastrophe,” referring to the low number of secondary school graduates and the large urban-rural and class inequalities. From 1962 to 1966, Paul Mikat from the CDU became minister of education in the last CDU-FDP coalition in NRW. He was young, more inclined to reforms than his predecessor, Werner Schütz, and supported experiments with tracked comprehensive schools (Reference MikatMikat, 1966, 38; Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs of NRW, 1965). He did not always have the support of more conservative CDU representatives. The former CDU politician Wilhelm Lenz mentioned that Mikat “would have been willing to do more” if the minister of finance had not restrained him (expert interview). During the first half of the 1960s, the CDU-FDP government created new paths to the Abitur exam by extending evening schooling and upper-secondary schooling for Realschule graduates and by increasing the number of Realschulen and Gymnasien, especially in rural areas (Reference DüdingDüding, 2008, 488ff; Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs of NRW, 1965; Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs of NRW, 1967). This was not subject to much debate, as there was consensus that the number of Abitur graduates needed to be increased (Reference FälkerFälker, 1984, 101f).

In July 1964, the party executive committee of the SPD passed the “Educational-Political Guidelines” (Bildungspolitische Leitsätze), which more boldly than before suggested replacing parallel schooling with a ladder system of education and employed the term “comprehensive school” (Gesamtschule) for the first time. The social democrats now suggested a six-year primary level of schooling followed by a four-year lower-secondary level and a three-year upper-secondary level. For the lower-secondary level, they envisaged a common core of teaching in addition to differentiated teaching in courses and ability groups. They considered the introduction of a two-year orientation stage in grades five and six and increased permeability between the traditional school types to be steps in the right direction. In the long term, all school types should be integrated into one organizational unit (Vorstand der SPD, 1964, 12ff). The NRW chapter of the Education and Science Workers’ Union (GEW) also included the integrated comprehensive school (integrierte Gesamtschule) in its program in 1965.

The Association of Philologists, on the other hand, opposed comprehensive schooling in its Göttingen Resolutions published in 1964:

In the same document, the Association of Philologists supported an educational expansion based on preparatory forms of the Gymnasium and Realschule [Aufbauschulen /Aufbauklassen]. It also emphasized parents’ rights to decide about the education of their children. Permeability between the school types was supported to a certain degree but not “at any time point” since this would lead to “a lowering of achievements.” The philologists viewed the Gymnasium as the school of the future elites and therefore as particularly important. It was stated,

In October 1964, the Düsseldorf Agreement of 1955 between the federal states was renegotiated. The result was the Hamburg Agreement. This agreement stipulated nine years of obligatory schooling and allowed ten years of obligatory schooling. It suggested the introduction of the Hauptschule – meaning the upper stage of the Volksschule – as a secondary school type in addition to the Realschule and Gymnasium, and a two-year transition stage in grades five and six, which should be common for all schools. These were discretionary clauses. Upper-secondary courses, preparing Realschule and Hauptschule graduates for the Abitur, were regulated. A foreign language, usually English, was introduced to the curriculum of the Volksschule. Experiments with new school structures were allowed (Reference FriedeburgFriedeburg, 1992, 349). The Ministerpräsidenten of the federal states governed by the CDU also signed this document, which is an indication of the drive toward reform.

In November 1964, the CDU organized a political congress in Hamburg, at which new guidelines for “education in the modern world” were passed. Here, the CDU stated, “the German education system must be shaped so that everyone, who is […] capable, is offered his chance.” It supported increased “permeability” of the school system through the introduction of preparatory forms of the Gymnasium and Realschule [Aufbauschulen], which should recruit able students from the Volksschule. “In our education system, there must be no ‘one-way streets,’” the guidelines said. Nevertheless, the guidelines emphasized that a shortening of the Gymnasium would endanger academic standards. A comprehensive school was considered unsuitable for the aim of supporting all talents in the population. The paper also opposed an obligatory orientation stage in grades five and six.

Educational planning was intensified. In 1965, the German Educational Council (Deutscher Bildungsrat) was founded as the successor of the above-mentioned German Committee. It was comprised of an educational commission consisting of scientists and an administrative commission, which included school administrators and educational politicians. The council published reports, studies, and recommendations for experiments and reforms (see e.g. Reference Herrlitz, Weiland and WinkelDeutscher Bildungsrat, 2003 [1969]; Deutscher Bildungsrat, 1973; Deutscher Bildungsrat, 1975).

In June 1966, the CDU-FDP government of NRW passed a law on obligatory schooling (Schulpflichtgesetz) that regulated the introduction of nine years of obligatory schooling. The law introduced the institutional distinction between the four-year primary school (Grundschule) and the five-year upper stage of the Volksschule, now called Hauptschule (Reference FälkerFälker, 1984, 75, 114). However, the Hauptschule remained attached to the Grundschule. This was opposed by the SPD. Social democrats voted against the law because they did not find it far-reaching enough (Landtag NRW, May 11, 1966; Landtag NRW, May 25, 1966).

On June 14, 1966, the NRW section of the Association of Philologists organized a rally in Essen to protest the new trends in education politics. The chair of the NRW section, Clemens Christians, argued at the rally that it was wrong to assign the Gymnasium the achievement of equality of opportunity. Equality of opportunity could only be achieved through additional support in preschool (quoted in Reference FluckFluck, 2003, 215). Reference FluckFluck (2003, 216) also quotes vice-chair Hanna-Renate Laurien, who later became minister of education in the Rhineland-Palatinate for the CDU. She said,

The Introduction of the Integrated Comprehensive School

In July 1966, the SPD won the NRW elections. The new Ministerpräsident, Heinz Kühn, preferred a coalition with the CDU, but the parliamentary group insisted on forming a government with the FDP (Reference DüdingDüding, 2008, 520ff). In education politics, the most pressing issue was still denominational schooling. Through negotiations with the CDU, a compromise was reached in June 1967 and new school laws were passed in February 1968. The Hauptschule was decoupled from the primary school and became nondenominational (see Chapter 5).

In 1968, the national Education and Science Workers’ Union passed a motion for the integrated comprehensive school. It was not the first union to do so – the Industrial Union of Metalworkers (IG Metall) and the German Confederation of Trade Unions (DGB) had passed motions in support of the integrated comprehensive school earlier on (Reference KopitzschKopitzsch, 1983, 221, 269). There had been internal debates in the Education and Science Workers’ Union (Reference KopitzschKopitzsch, 1983, 228). Ilse Brusis, active in the union from 1960 and chair of the NRW chapter from 1975 to 1981, described how the union’s young teachers decided to struggle for comprehensive schools in the late 1960s:

The expert Anne Ratzki, who has also been active in the union for decades, confirmed that, in some cases, even the union’s Hauptschule teachers were against integrated comprehensive schools on the local level, if the introduction of such a school implied that their own school would be shut. Internal divisions between teachers at different school types persisted after the integrated comprehensive school had been included in the union’s official program. In other words, the Education and Science Workers’ Union was not entirely united.

In January 1969, the German Educational Council published a recommendation for school experiments with integrated comprehensive schools, which should integrate the parallel school system with the help of internal ability grouping (Reference Herrlitz, Weiland and WinkelDeutscher Bildungsrat, 2003 [1969]). Around the same time, the Kühn government decreed the establishment of the first seven such experimental schools in NRW. These were located in Dortmund, Fröndenberg, Gelsenkirchen, Kamen, Kierspe, Oberhausen, and Münster. In November 1969, the Standing Conference of the Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs of the federal states agreed on an experimental program with forty such schools throughout the Federal Republic (Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 113).

Not all leading social democrats supported the integrated comprehensive school experiments wholeheartedly. In NRW, neither the Ministerpräsident, Heinz Kühn, nor the minister of education from 1966 to 1970, Fritz Holthoff, were particularly enthusiastic. According to several interviewed experts, Kühn did not prioritize comprehensive schooling because he wanted to avoid conflict and thought that it would be sufficient to open the Gymnasium up to children from the working class. Holthoff was a Volksschule teacher and cared about working-class children’s access to good-quality education. However, he belonged to the older generation and did not like the rhetoric of the party’s younger, more anticapitalistic wing. Much of Holthoff’s writing was dedicated to his conflict with the “New Left,” whom he accused of turning the comprehensive school into a school “which institutionalizes class struggle and class hate” (Reference HolthoffHolthoff, 1975, 16). Reference HolthoffHolthoff (1975, 16) did support a “convergence of school types” into a “general school” with the aim of achieving “social integration” but thought that such a development should be conducted “patiently and with convincing words.”

The social democratic school reformer and social scientist H.-G. Rolff, who belonged to the SPD’s leftist wing, believes that lack of support from Holthoff was crucial, since Holthoff was minister of education in the largest federal state at an important time:

After the elections of 1970, conditions became more favorable for reform. The reform supporter Jürgen Girgensohn became minister of education in NRW. In the coalition agreement of the SPD and the FDP, the intended intensification of comprehensive school experiments was stated. The elections had brought several reform-oriented, young people into the NRW parliament, replacing older SPD politicians (Reference DüdingDüding, 2008, 631).

One of them was the interviewed expert Reinhard Grätz, who confirmed that the SPD was far from united on comprehensive schooling. He replaced an SPD politician from his hometown of Wuppertal, Walter Jahnke. Jahnke had been chair of the SPD parliamentary group’s working group for cultural issues. He was a Realschule teacher and was not supportive of the integrated comprehensive school. Two other SPD education politicians, Hans-Joachim Bargmann and Hans-Günther Toetemeyer, opposed Jahnke in this group. They were reform-oriented representatives of the teachers’ organization within the SPD (Arbeitsgemeinschaft sozialdemokratischer Lehrer). As Grätz described it in the interview,

Another young, reform-oriented SPD politician, who was voted into parliament in 1970, was Anke Brunn. She summarized the justification for comprehensive schooling as follows:

This idea increasingly gained ground. In 1970, the German Educational Council published the Structural Plan for the Education System (Deutscher Bildungsrat, 1973; Reference Herrlitz, Hopf and TitzeHerrlitz et al., 2009, 175ff), where it suggested a ladder system of education. The system should start with preschool education and continue with a four-year primary school, followed by a lower- and upper-secondary stage. The fifth and sixth grades should be an orientation stage. Differentiation based on interests and abilities should start at the lower-secondary stage with elective courses.

Within the FDP, there had also been changes around 1970, and the social-liberal wing of the party was strengthened. In the early manifestos of the FDP, such as the one of 1961, there were only general formulations stating that access to higher education should be opened to “talented people from the employed population” and should not be prevented by “economic reasons.” During the 1960s, the social-liberal wing began to advocate school reforms more explicitly (see e.g. Reference DahrendorfDahrendorf, 1965; Reference HeinzHeinz, 1970). In 1969–70, the FDP introduced its concept of the “Open School” (Offene Schule). The Open School was the liberal version of the integrated comprehensive school and differed from the social democratic concept in its more pronounced focus on internal differentiation. The NRW FDP stated in its manifesto for the NRW elections of 1970,

In the same manifesto, the NRW FDP supported the expansion of experiments with comprehensive schools. The manifesto stated that all former school types should be combined in the Open School, which should be divided into a kindergarten level, a primary school level, a lower-secondary level, and an upper-secondary level. The manifesto advocated a “flexible course system” within the Open School and individual support for all students. In 1972, the FDP published its Stuttgart Guidelines for Liberal Education Politics (Stuttgarter Leitlinien), in which it confirmed its support for far-reaching comprehensive school reforms.

In 1970, the Kühn government published a manifesto for NRW, which listed the reforms it intended to implement from 1971 to 1975 (Nordrhein-Westfalen-Programm 1975). This document stated that “the general idea of the comprehensive school […] is hardly contested today” and suggested the establishment of thirty integrated comprehensive schools. This aim was not reached, but by 1975 sixteen more such schools had been founded. For the long term, the document announced that comprehensive education would be introduced on a general level, if experiments were favorable. It mentioned the reduction of educational inequality between urban and rural areas as an argument for comprehensive schools. Children from different social strata should learn to cooperate and students’ achievements should be increased through an increased “joy in learning.”

The manifesto also included suggestions to increase the number of Gymnasium schools and to expand the Hauptschule with a tenth school year. This was not considered as standing in the way of a more far-reaching structural reform in the future. The upgrading of the Hauptschule was important for social democrats. In 1969, the education policy committee of the SPD (Bildungspolitischer Ausschuss) warned that the Hauptschule was about to become a “rest school” with low social standing and argued that the Hauptschulen would have to be of good enough quality to ensure that they could be transformed into comprehensive schools later (ENTWURF: Modell für ein demokratisches Bildungswesen, 1969, 47; see also Reference Dowe, Dowe and FrommbergerDowe, 1968; Reference Hippenstiel, Dowe and FrommbergerHippenstiel, 1968).

Reforms Suggested by the Christian Democratic Union

The reformers among the interviewed experts were, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, convinced that a general introduction of the comprehensive school was possible. It seemed as though, with thorough planning, most political goals would be achievable. When I interviewed the former leading CDU politician Wilhelm Lenz, I asked him whether this reform spirit had to a certain degree affected the CDU in NRW. He replied,

In other words, the CDU now showed cautious willingness for reform, for strategic reasons and because of the conviction of a few reform-oriented CDU politicians. In its Deidesheimer Guidelines of 1969 (Deidesheimer Leitsätze), the CDU again outlined its education policy. Education was termed a “basic right.” “Equality of opportunity in the access to educational institutions” was considered “a condition for a democratic social order, in which achievement decides the social standing of the individual.” The manifesto demanded a “tracked achievement school” (gegliederte Leistungsschule) with “differentiated, permeable” educational paths, namely, for the secondary level, the five-year Hauptschule, the six-year Realschule, and the eight- or nine-year Gymnasium. The tracked structure was justified by differing “abilities and inclinations of the individual” and by the “varied educational requirements of society.” The manifesto suggested that curricula in grades five and six should be similar in all school types so that it would be possible to correct the choice of educational path during this time. In other words, the CDU now supported a weakened version of the orientation stage. The manifesto supported the introduction of ten years of obligatory schooling “in the medium term.”

From 1970 until 1972, the CDU published a range of more reform-oriented documents. In 1970, the NRW CDU published its manifesto for the federal state elections. Here, the NRW CDU demanded a “sensible integration of all educational institutions” and that principles of “permeability and differentiation” should be equally ranked. It also demanded ten years of obligatory education and teacher training oriented toward levels of schooling rather than school types. However, as the manifesto stated, “intellectually gifted [students] need to be particularly supported.” The manifesto emphasized that “objectively equal educational chances” should become “subjectively” accessible through better educational counseling.

In 1971 the national CDU published a manifesto for schooling and university education (Schul- und Hochschulreformprogramm der CDU), and in 1972 CDU politicians, including several ministers of education, published a paper entitled “Education Politics on Clear Paths – a Program of CDU/CSU Priorities.” In the 1971 manifesto, the CDU demanded the introduction of organizational differentiation within all school types and a reform of curricula so all schools would teach “common core obligatory subjects” and permeability would be increased. It even stated that “the new secondary level overcomes the three-pillared structure through a clearly arranged, permeable combination of schools [Schulverbund].” The documents from 1971 and 1972 also supported a reform of teacher training oriented toward levels of schooling rather than school types and the introduction of an orientation stage in grades five and six.

In NRW, the CDU parliamentary group prepared a motion in 1971 that suggested experiments with “cooperative comprehensive schools”; this was meant as a more strictly tracked alternative to the integrated comprehensive school. It was emphasized that this school type should be “more than an additive combination of the Hauptschule, Realschule and Gymnasium,” that it should have a shared headship and enable students to switch between the tracks (Landtag NRW, November 15, 1971).

In 1973 the CDU representative Karl Nagel, a Hauptschule teacher, even suggested in the parliamentary education committee that the cooperative comprehensive school, as designed by the CDU, could be introduced with blanket coverage from August 1, 1974, without further experiments. He stated that while the school experiments with integrated comprehensive schools only encompassed a small percentage of students, the CDU proposal of 1971 had been intended to “initiate a reform of the entire lower secondary level” (Landtag NRW, September 13, 1973, 9). This is remarkable, for if the SPD and the FDP had gone along with this suggestion, the Gymnasium would have been abolished as a separate school type. The SPD’s education politicians, however, favored the more far-reaching integrated comprehensive school. They considered the CDU proposal a continuation of the traditional school system with “the fig leaf of so-called cooperation,” since the CDU proposal envisaged a differentiated, not an integrated, orientation stage (Hans Schwier, SPD representative, Landtag NRW, September 13, 1973, 11).

Remarks by CDU politicians during the parliamentary education committee’s meeting in September 1973 indicate that their support for cooperative schooling was motivated by several worries. When the CDU motion for cooperative comprehensive schools was debated, the crisis of the Hauptschule was discussed. A speaker for the Ministry of Education remarked, “with respect to the question whether the cooperative school could reduce the increasing popularity of the Gymnasium,” one needed to consider that parents had the constitutional right to choose the school type for their children (Landtag NRW, September 13, 1973, 11). CDU representative Nagel responded that it was necessary to channel the “streams of students,” or else one would have to restrict parental rights of choice or introduce admission exams at the universities (Landtag NRW, September 13, 1973, 12). One motivation of the CDU in the early 1970s thus seems to have been to re-channel a greater number of students back to the Hauptschule school type (or – in this concept – track) and away from the prestigious Abitur exam and university entry. As Nagel later explained in parliament, the other motivation was to undermine the more far-reaching idea of integrated comprehensive schooling (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 105f):

During the early 1970s, the CDU was not perceived as a stable ally by the Association of Philologists but considered “very unsettled and split into different political directions in education politics,” as the philologists’ representative, Reference FluckFluck (2003, 228), points out. The CDU could not be depended upon. The Association of Philologists had no such periods of insecurity but opposed any reform that endangered the Gymnasium as a nine-year secondary school.

Continued Struggles over the Integrated Comprehensive School

After several years of negotiations, the Commission for Educational Planning published the General Education Plan in 1973. The national government and the six SPD-led federal states wanted to introduce comprehensive education until the tenth grade. The five CDU-led federal states expressed dissenting opinions with respect to the introduction of integrated comprehensive schools and the orientation stage in grades five and six (Bund-Länder-Kommission für Bildungsplanung, 1973, 16; Reference FriedeburgFriedeburg, 1992, 404ff; Reference Herrlitz, Hopf and TitzeHerrlitz et al., 2009, 177f). Toward the NRW elections of 1975, comprehensive schooling increasingly turned into an “apple of discord” (Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 116). The atmosphere changed.

In May 1974, the NRW government proposed a motion according to which the integrated comprehensive school would become a regular school type (Regelschule). The motion suggested that the parallel structure should be abolished in favor of a horizontal ladder system. The two-year orientation stage in grades five and six should become the rule and be independent of school type, so that comprehensive schooling would be prolonged by two years (Landtag NRW, May 7, 1974). When the proposal was debated, minister of education Girgensohn specified that the proposal was not meant to abolish the old school types straightaway but should merely lay the ground for a long-term reform. In his view, it was probable that the introduction of fully comprehensive schooling would first be accomplished in the course of one generation (Landtag NRW, July 11, 1974, 4436). “I don’t want integration at any price!” he declared (Landtag NRW, July 11, 1974, 4466).

But even this modest proposal soon seemed too radical. The comprehensive school experiment was now perceived to be “in crisis,” as discussed in a publication of the Association of Education and Upbringing (Verband Bildung und Erziehung, VBE) (VBE, 1974). In this publication, the association stated that it neither supported nor opposed the experiments in principle, but it did not approve of radical reformers’ attempts to use comprehensive schooling as a tool for social change. The experiments should focus on pedagogical questions, with the aim to create a school more attuned to students’ needs than the current system, but should not be used for anticapitalistic propaganda. Even though the chair of the NRW chapter of the Association of Education and Upbringing at the time, Albert Balduin, supported the comprehensive school, the association did not want to be associated with socialist ideas. It was already losing some of its Catholic members, while increasing numbers of moderate social democrats were joining (Reference BongardBongard, 2012, 11f). Still, many of the CDU’s municipal politicians and some CDU parliamentary representatives were members of the association. It had to balance its positions carefully. As Uwe Franke, a representative of the Association of Education and Upbringing NRW, explained,

The increasing political polarization came to expression in the federal elections in Hessen in 1974.Footnote ¹ In NRW, the SPD’s coalition partner FDP now blocked the implementation of the orientation stage. As a result, a law was passed in February 1974 which merely continued the experimental status of the comprehensive schools. The reference to the long-term integration of all school types was removed. The orientation stage was not mentioned at all (Landtag NRW, February 19, 1975). In the final parliamentary debate regarding this law, the speaker for the FDP, Wolfgang Heinz, justified the latter decision by adducing time pressures, since the legislative period was almost over. He stated,

He declared that an attempt to pass the orientation stage in the course of only one or two months would have been met by the opposition with “prevarications and purposeful misrepresentations” in order to create an “adrenalized atmosphere” (Landtag NRW, February 27, 1975, 5265). Furthermore, he underlined that a six-year primary school would be a better solution but that the FDP had not received support from the other parliamentary groups for this suggestion. The CDU opposition met Heinz with derision. CDU representatives interrupted him, calling him a “pushover,” and ridiculing the FDP’s change of mind as a “dancing procession” (Landtag NRW, February 27, 1975, 5265).

In the same debate, the minister of education, Girgensohn, was the only SPD speaker who – with characteristic honesty – admitted that he was unhappy with the changes made to the motion (Landtag NRW, February 27, 1975, 5271ff). Ministerpräsident Kühn stated that, for him, the comprehensive school was the most desirable school type of the future but that opponents of such reforms should not be overruled but persuaded. When the leader of the CDU opposition, Heinrich Köppler, attacked him for the first part of his statement, he stated that, in his view, the comprehensive school was still in a state of experimentation and that it was not the SPD’s aim to introduce this school type as a regular one immediately. He even spoke against an extension of the number of experimental schools (Landtag NRW, February 27, 1975, 5268, 5270).

The CDU’s willingness for reform had now evaporated. The CDU’s manifesto for the NRW elections in 1975 stated,

The CDU had now replaced the term “equality of opportunity” (Chancengleichheit) with the term “fairness of opportunity” (Chancengerechtigkeit). This was an attempt to underline that inequality was not a problem, as long as everybody received a fair chance. The party had also given up its support for ten years of obligatory schooling and had gone back to the position that nine years of obligatory schooling were enough. Experiments with integrated comprehensive schools, it was stated, would only be supported if “they are necessary to develop new pedagogical and school-organizational insights, if they are continuously scientifically controlled, […] and if alternatives are provided.” A comprehensive orientation stage was rejected, and it was instead suggested that curricula in grades five and six should be coordinated across school types. The manifesto of 1975 declared that the “neglected Hauptschule” would be developed into an “attractive alternative to the Realschule and Gymnasium.”

The SPD’s manifesto for the NRW elections of 1975 remarked,

The “problems” referred to here were manifold. For example, the experimental schools were accused of underperforming academically. As Anne Ratzki, principal of one of the first integrated comprehensive schools in NRW, pointed out, the opponents were comparing “apples with pears,” since the social background of the children in the integrated comprehensive schools was different from the social background of the children in the Gymnasium. The experimental schools also struggled with a lack of suitable school material, curricula, and buildings, and teachers’ lack of experience of comprehensive teaching. In Ratzki’s words,

The NRW elections of 1975, and the national elections of 1976, showed that the SPD was losing ground to the CDU. Unemployment was rising and a crisis was under way in the steel industry (Reference Briesen, Briesen, Brunn, Elkar and ReuleckeBriesen, 1995, 244ff). In his first government policy statement after the election of 1975, Kühn pointed out that slowing economic growth meant that public revenue would diminish. He declared that the aim of the government would be to “secure the initiated reforms” and that educational reforms should be continued in a “sober-minded” way. The development of curricula and teacher training should take precedence over organizational reforms (Landtag NRW, June 4, 1975, 14ff). The coalition agreement did not contain far-reaching educational-political suggestions. Experiments with comprehensive schools would be continued with the earlier planned number of thirty schools (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 16; Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 117).

The strategy of the CDU now became to justify the parallel school structure with an increased focus on the Hauptschule. Several CDU representatives, such as Karl Nagel and Peter Giesen, who were Volksschule/Hauptschule teachers, genuinely cared about this school type. When I interviewed him, the CDU politician Wilhelm Lenz explained that, in internal CDU debates, the supporters of the Hauptschule had convinced him to support their struggle for better financing of this school type and better salaries for its teachers. This inner-party class compromise satisfied representatives of the Hauptschule clientele while giving Gymnasium supporters a convenient justification for the pillared school structure. As long as all school types were valued and permeability between them was ensured, a united CDU saw no need for further reform. For example, the CDU representative and Hauptschule teacher Albert Pürsten remarked in a parliamentary debate that two of his daughters had attended the Hauptschule but had attained the school-leaving certificate of the Realschule [the Mittlere Reife]. To him, this was proof that comprehensive school reforms were simply not necessary because permeability of the school system had already been achieved (Landtag NRW, July 11, 1974, 4461).

Of course, what the CDU suggested to “support” the Hauptschule was a reduction in educational demands. In May 1976, the CDU parliamentary group proposed a motion entitled “Reform of the Hauptschule,” which stated that it was “unpedagogical and inhumane” to confront Hauptschule students with “excessive demands of abstraction.” They should receive a more practical – but “equally valuable” – education (Landtag NRW, May 5, 1976; Landtag NRW, April 2, 1979). The fact that “a certain social destiny inevitably leads to the Hauptschule and to a particular occupational […] world,” as the FDP representative Silke Geringk-Groht put it, was ignored (Landtag NRW, May 3, 1979, 7056). Acknowledging this would have meant saying openly that the lower classes were incapable of “abstraction” and should receive only practical education.

Wilhelm Lenz, former leading CDU politician, summed up the position of the CDU as follows:

The Failed Introduction of the Cooperative School

After the elections of 1975, neither Kühn nor the leader of the FDP’s parliamentary group, Horst-Ludwig Riemer, were keen on further reform attempts. When the government abstained from any new initiative in education politics, the parliamentary groups took the matter in hand (Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 117ff). Hans Schwier, educational political spokesman of the SPD’s parliamentary group, and Friedrich Wilhelm Fernau, consultant of the SPD’s parliamentary group, prepared a law proposal for the introduction of “cooperative schools,” which they published in March 1976 in the journal of the Education and Science Workers’ Union.

A cooperative school was defined as a school lasting from the fifth to the tenth grade and consisted of a comprehensive orientation stage in grades five and six, followed by parallel tracks based on the Hauptschule, Realschule, and Gymnasium. An upper-secondary stage leading to the Abitur exam could be added. The school should consist of at least four but usually of six to nine parallel classes for each age group (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 19f). After the national elections of 1976, which Helmut Schmidt’s social liberal government won by a small margin, the law proposal was broached in the NRW parliament (Landtag NRW, November 9, 1976; Landtag NRW, November 25, 1976). In this debate, the spokesperson for the SPD, Schwier, appealed to the CDU:

Other speakers for the SPD pointed out that demographic development would soon put schools in rural areas under pressure. This problem could be solved by cooperative schools. They criticized the CDU for not supporting the proposal even though it was similar to the law proposal for cooperative schools that the CDU had made in 1971. They quoted from the CDU’s manifestos to show that cooperation between the existing school types was what the CDU normally claimed to support. They argued that the cooperative school would lead to more choices for parents, not fewer, and emphasized that the cooperative school would neither delay nor accelerate the introduction of integrated comprehensive schooling but that it was an entirely independent reform. The CDU’s claim that the cooperative school was a step toward the introduction of the integrated comprehensive school was said to be false.

Minister of education Girgensohn was the exception: he expressed openly that, in his view, a cooperative school could only be a “transitional stage” on the way toward the general introduction of the integrated comprehensive school. This was directed at the comprehensive schooling “purists” in the Education and Science Workers’ Union and the leftist wing of the SPD, who thought that the reform proposal was a bad idea. These groups believed that the cooperative school would not further but delay more far-reaching reforms (Landtag NRW, November 25, 1976, 1826ff). For example, Anne Ratzki, member of the SPD, the Education and Science Workers’ Union, and the Organization Comprehensive School, described how shocked she was to find that a new school reform was planned while “their” school had not even left the experimental state:

Girgensohn was thus right that these groups would have to be convinced of the reform but was nevertheless heavily criticized for his statement in a later meeting of his parliamentary group (Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 119). His statement was considered to have been strategically unhelpful. And indeed, during the debate, the conservative speakers rejoiced in Girgensohn’s “honesty” and accused the other speakers of the SPD to be lying about their true political aims. The CDU speaker, Nagel, remarked that the Hauptschule needed to be reformed before it could be included in any kind of cooperative school. The CDU was not “in principle against a cooperative school,” but what was really needed was an increased focus on the pedagogical work in the Hauptschule (Landtag NRW, November 25, 1976, 1812ff).

The speaker for the FDP, Jürgen Hinrichs, supported the reform proposal with the argument that it would reduce costs and ensure the educational supply at a time of declining birth rates (Landtag NRW, November 25, 1976, 1819). In the expert interview, he explained that he was skeptical of the reform at first but was convinced by more leftist party fellows such as Wolfgang Heinz that it would be a useful reform for less populated areas, like his own municipality in eastern Westphalia. Heinz also spoke in the debate but used a considerable amount of his speaking time to criticize Girgensohn for having claimed that the cooperative school should be a step toward the comprehensive school. Such a “personal statement of faith” was not backed by the liberal parliamentary group and the coalition agreement, Heinz argued (Landtag NRW, November 25, 1976, 1831).

On December 10, 1976, the Association of Philologists NRW decided to start a campaign against the cooperative school. In January 1977, the campaign began. The leader of the CDU, Heinrich Köppler, decided that the CDU would “spearhead the movement in solidarity,” and support it financially (quoted in Reference RösnerRösner, 1981, 116). The campaign was supported by conservative teachers’ and parents’ organizations: the Realschule teachers’ organization (Realschullehrerverband), the parents’ associations of the Gymnasium (Landeselternschaft der Gymnasien in Nordrhein-Westfalen) and the Realschule (Verband der Elternschaften Deutscher Realschulen), the Association of German Catholic Female Teachers, a Catholic parents’ association, the Association for Freedom of Research (Bund Freiheit der Wissenschaft), and the parents’ associations Elternverein Nordrhein-Westfalen, Landesschulpflegschaft Nordrhein-Westfalen, and Arbeitsgemeinschaft von Schulpflegschaften im Regierungsbezirk Münster (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 135).

The FDP was now highly split. On January 21, 1977, the NRW FDP’s chair and NRW minister for economic affairs, Horst-Ludwig Riemer, proposed a motion at a meeting of the FDP’s parliamentary group that was entitled “Reservations against the Cooperative School.” Riemer was an economic liberal. He expressed worries that were shared by leading national FDP politicians, such as Hans-Dietrich Genscher, that NRW was about to “turn into a second Hessen” (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 70). Many critical and supportive letters to the FDP’s office in Düsseldorf during the first weeks of 1977 document the split within the party (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 70). In February, Riemer gave a press interview in which he criticized his own parliamentary group for isolating itself from the party. On February 10, 1977, the FDP parliamentary group met with the FDP federal state board to discuss the issue. Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal (1988, 69ff) refers to a discussion paper written by the skeptics on the federal state board. Here, they criticized tactical mistakes, such as an underestimation of the opposition from parents and the CDU, unnecessary time pressures, and insufficient discussion of the law proposal within the FDP. They disagreed in principle with the reformers in the parliamentary group, for example regarding the orientation stage, which they only wanted to experiment with, instead of implementing it straightaway (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 72ff).

The campaign against the proposal gathered momentum and there were large demonstrations. In March 1977, the SPD and the FDP lost the federal state elections in Hessen, where the introduction of the comprehensive orientation stage had been debated fiercely. The reformers were on the defensive. To calm the opposition, the law proposal was changed so that the orientation stage would no longer have to be comprehensive but could be tracked. A cooperative school could now also consist of only two tracks so that rural areas with only two existing school types could implement it more easily. It was underlined that municipal school authorities were not obliged to introduce the cooperative school, but that it was merely a legal offer (Angebotsschule). The schools were now supposed to be smaller and had to include an upper-secondary stage leading to the Abitur. None of this helped win over the CDU. The CDU’s motions of the early 1970s were off the table.

Within the FDP, opposition remained significant. The chairs of the FDP chapters of Düsseldorf and Cologne publicly opposed the reform in press interviews (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 75). In June 1977, the FDP federal state committee finally decided to support the law proposal but against the opposition of a sizable number of critics (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 86ff). In the second parliamentary debate on the proposal, the liberal speakers continued to support the reform and ignored the split in their own party (Landtag NRW, June 29, 1977; Landtag NRW, October 26, 1977). Gerigk-Groht, who with Heinz and Hinrichs was responsible for education politics and, like them, represented the social liberal wing, attacked the CDU:

The leader of the CDU’s parliamentary group, Heinrich Köppler, on the other hand, had now sensed that there was a possibility “to create a furor in the majority of the population” if one opposed all further organizational reforms (Wilhelm Lenz, former CDU politician, expert interview). In the debate, Köppler emphasized that “the people in the country finally want some rest.” He criticized the coalition for wanting to have their way, no matter what, and for ignoring the “reactions in the population.” The CDU, he claimed, cared more about “the content of schooling than [about] its organization.” It would stand by the side of students, parents, and teachers against this “so-called cooperative school.” He also pointed to the internal split of the SPD and the FDP and mocked Ministerpräsident Kühn and his FDP deputy, Riemer, for carrying out a reform they did not really support (Landtag NRW, June 29, 1977, 2894ff).

Indeed, Ministerpräsident Kühn had not been convinced from the outset. In a newspaper interview in February 1977, he stated that one should not “force anything on the parents.” He pointed out that while he supported the proposal “in principle,” it been prepared by the parliamentary groups, “not by the government” (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 33). In June 1977, the aging Kühn was replaced as chair of the NRW SPD by the young Johannes Rau, a reform supporter. At the same party congress, several motions were passed that emphasized that the cooperative school would only be a step toward comprehensive schooling and repudiated tracking in grades five and six. The SPD had also begun to react to the opposition’s campaign by publishing leaflets and suchlike. Nevertheless, the split within the party remained palpable.

The school reformer H.-G. Rolff, a member of the SPD and the Organization Comprehensive School, described how he came to understand that an abolition of the Gymnasium and a general introduction of comprehensive schools were no longer enforceable within the SPD and that Schwier had developed the law proposal for the cooperative school because he perceived it to be the “last chance” (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 18). Rolff had been invited by Schwier to internal meetings with SPD representatives, at which the law proposal was discussed:

On October 26, 1977, the law on cooperative schools was debated for the last time and passed by the SPD and the FDP against the opposition of the CDU. The chair of the FDP parliamentary group, Hans Koch, claimed that the FDP had never considered abandoning the law proposal (Landtag NRW, October 26, 1977, 3257). This statement might have been true of the parliamentary group but not of the party as a whole. Koch criticized the Catholic bishops of NRW for interfering in the debate with an episcopal letter (Landtag NRW, October 26, 1977, 3278). This letter warned against a “comprehensive school which could become an instrument of social change with ideological characteristics” and was read aloud in all churches and published as a leaflet (quoted in Reference SeifertSeifert, 2013, 254). There were also reports of Catholic priests and nuns who mobilized against the cooperative school (Reference SeifertSeifert, 2013, 259f). Koch regretted that “the money of the CDU and the ‘non-blessing’ [or ‘bane’] of the ministerial church [were coming together] against the educational-political initiatives of the SPD/FDP coalition” (Landtag NRW, October 26, 1977, 3278). He also declared,

In September 1977, the Association of Philologists and the other organizations belonging to the movement against the cooperative school formed the Citizens’ Action for a Petition for a Referendum against the Cooperative School (Bürgeraktion Volksbegehren gegen die kooperative Schule) (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 135). The Citizens’ Action movement argued against a “leveling of achievement” and accused the cooperative school of being the first step toward the general introduction of integrated comprehensive schools. The term “socialist comprehensive school” [sozialistische Einheitsschule] was widely used. It was argued that the cooperative school would destroy the Gymnasium (Reference RösnerRösner 1981, 168ff, 216f). Less prominently, the movement argued that the cooperative school endangered the Catholic Hauptschulen that remained after the reform of denominational schooling of 1968 (Reference SeifertSeifert, 2013, 245ff; see Chapter 5). Support for the pillared structure was justified with the theory of “endowment,” according to which “intelligence is up to 80% hereditary and only up to 20% related to the environment” (propaganda material by the Citizens’ Action movement, quoted in Reference RösnerRösner, 1981, 170). Finally, the movement emphasized parental rights of choice. From February 16, 1978, to March 1, 1978, the movement collected 3 636 932 signatures for a referendum on the law, equivalent to 29.8 percent of the population of NRW eligible to vote. The 20 percent quorum was exceeded by almost 10 percent. Especially in rural areas, many people signed (Reference RösnerRösner, 1981, 172).

Only three relevant teachers’ and parents’ associations did not support the Citizens’ Action movement (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 135): the parents’ association of the integrated comprehensive schools (Landeselternrat der Gesamtschulen in Nordrhein-Westfalen), the Education and Science Workers’ Union, and the Association of Education and Upbringing. The latter aimed at the upgrading of the Hauptschule through an integration of the Hauptschule and Realschule and was neither a strong supporter nor opponent of integrated comprehensive schooling or cooperative schooling (VBE, 1978; 1991, 66). As its former chair Uwe Franke explained in the expert interview, several of its leading members opposed the Citizens’ Action movement, but they could not bind their members to this position. Franke emphasized that the high number of signatures was an expression of general uneasiness resulting from far-reaching social changes: “There was a great social struggle where a great deal was lumped together which very much constituted a test of the internal unity of our association” (expert interview). The Association of Education and Upbringing therefore attempted to stay out of the conflict.

The Education and Science Workers’ Union NRW campaigned against the referendum, but many of its members were not fully motivated. As former chair of the Education and Science Workers’ Union NRW Ilse Brusis put it, they thought that the cooperative school was “neither fish nor fowl” and difficult to defend (expert interview). They were worried that this half-baked reform would discredit the integrated comprehensive school. Nevertheless, some hoped that it could perhaps be a modest first step.

The SPD and the FDP also campaigned against the referendum, but, as the FDP politician Wolfgang Heinz put it, “the reform momentum which was characteristic of the second half of the sixties and the early seventies for the SPD and FDP alike was strongly diminished, if not evaporated” (expert interview). In a special issue of the NRW FDP’s newspaper, Forum liberal, of February 1978, it was emphasized that they were not attempting to abolish the Gymnasium and it was even stated that “the FDP and SPD support a pillared school system” (FDP Landesverband NRW/Wolfgang-Döring-Stiftung, 1978, 2). The former FDP politician Jürgen Hinrichs regretted in the expert interview that they had not managed to get that message across.

A day after the Citizens’ Action movement’s success was made public, the coalition committee, consisting of the leaders of the parliamentary groups, decided that the law would be repealed. There would be no referendum. The parliamentary groups had no choice but to agree. The cooperative school was taken off the agenda (Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 123f; Reference SeifertSeifert, 2013, 317ff). As pointed out by Reinhard Grätz, Kühn repealed the law “not unwillingly, since the cabinet overall didn’t think much of it” (expert interview). The reformer Anne Ratzki summed up how supporters of comprehensive schooling analyzed the defeat:

This event marks the end point of this study. It had become clear that the integrated comprehensive school would not be introduced on a general level, since not even the cooperative school had survived the political process. In March 1978 the new chair of the NRW SPD, Johannes Rau, declared in a letter to all SPD officials that the new aim would be to turn the integrated comprehensive school into an additional regular school type (Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 125). In September 1978, Rau was elected Ministerpräsident. In the SPD and the FDP manifestos for the elections of 1980, both parties made it clear that they would not abolish the traditional school types. The SPD won the elections, partly because of tensions in international politics (Reference DüdingDüding, 2008, 749). The SPD now had an absolute majority of seats, as the FDP did not make it over the barring clause. In July 1981, the social democrats turned the integrated comprehensive school into a regular school type. The Standing Conference of the Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs of the federal states agreed in May 1982 to accept the school-leaving certificates of each other’s comprehensive schools. Up to 1987, forty-nine more integrated comprehensive schools were founded in NRW (Reference BlumenthalBlumenthal, 1988, 371ff). During the late 1970s and the 1980s, ten years of obligatory schooling were introduced (Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 38). The SPD’s strategy was now – and to some extent still is – to introduce comprehensive schooling in a bottom-up way, through decisions by municipalities, with the support of parental groups. Leading SPD politicians never again articulated the aim of abolishing parallel schooling, including the Gymnasium (Reference DüdingDüding, 1998, 175f).