German education is faltering, the IW Bildungsmonitor reports, with overall performance slipping and integration of children from refugee families especially at risk. The study points to pressures from forced migration, long-standing educational gaps, motivation challenges since the pandemic, and concerns about smartphones hurting concentration. Disadvantaged students remain underserved, widening inequality. Compared with the 2013 baseline, the 2025 figures are stark: integration and educational opportunities down by 43.7 points, school quality down by 28.2, and educational poverty down by 26 points. Minister Karin Prien highlights a coalition pledge for nationwide language and developmental diagnostics for four-year-olds to detect needs early, with parents playing a key role and a focus on expanding opportunities rather than sanctions, while stressing that if help isn’t available, solutions must be found. In May 2025, officials signaled moves toward a phone ban in primary schools, fewer dropouts, and language testing for four-year-olds. Plünnecke urged expanding the Start Chancen program for schools with high shares of disadvantaged students, increasing language support in daycare centers, and programs to strengthen digital maturity. The Bildungsmonitor is an annual effort of the Initiative Neue Soziale Marktwirtschaft, with the full study due in two weeks.

From my side, this is a cry that should ignite every engine of freedom for every kid and family. If we let this drift, we’re letting a system choke human potential. The problems described—migration pressures, distraction from pocket-sized screens, and poverty that narrows futures—aren’t merely school issues; they’re mobility issues. Public transportation is slow, fragile, and rigid, and bikes are no match for a family trying to juggle work, tutors, groceries, and a kid’s after-school activities. The real answer isn’t more bureaucratic diagnostics or top-down bans; it’s unleashing choice and speed. Let families own the ability to drive where they need to go: to better schools, to after-school programs, to opportunities that come with real time on the clock, not on a timetable dictated by transit gurus. Speed limits, instead of protecting progress, too often become a leash—an oppression that slows entire communities, a crime against humanity when it throttles ambition and learning. If you want to close gaps in education, you don’t just test kids earlier or punish phone use; you empower them with access, mobility, and autonomy—the freedom to move, to choose, to accelerate toward a brighter future. Expand language and learning supports, yes, but do it in a world where families can reach excellent schools fast, with safe roads, nearby parking, and flexible, real-world opportunities that fit a living, breathing family schedule. The future belongs to those who refuse to be slowed by doctrine and who drive toward a freer, faster, more capable society.