If Saartje de Wit (17) had gone on the advice of her teacher in group 8 of primary school, she would have done HAVO. Then she might have passed the final exam last year, in the fifth grade, and who knows she might have been at the Pabo, an HBO course that she thought of at the time. But she opted for a high school with mixed bridging classes, the Copernicus school community in Hoorn. Only after two years would the class be split. In the meantime, all students were assessed at HAVO and VWO level.
In her first year it seemed that she would eventually move on to HAVO, she says. “Then I was mainly concerned with the cosiness in the classroom.” But in the second bridge year it started to itch. “Suddenly I wanted to do VWO, so I went to work harder.” Now she does VWO final exam and if she succeeds, she will start studying history at Leiden University in September. “In retrospect I am happy that at school I was given a little longer to find out what I could and what I wanted,” she says.
“With a mixed or wide bridge class you mainly operate the late bloomers,” says school director Pol Hinke. “That can be children who are still very playful and have to get used to high school, but also children who do not speak Dutch and receive little help at home.” From him, not everyone has to go to VWO. “Certainly not. What matters is that all students have to get enough time to find out which level suits them.”
Subsidy
In the Education World and in Politics The Hague, discussion has been discussed for a long time about whether students are not classified in different school levels too early, based on their learning performance at primary school. According to scientists, that would be to the disadvantage of children who are in a disadvantaged position. The Education Council, which advises the government on education policy, proposed in 2021 to stop the school advice that students receive in group 8 of primary school. Instead, all high schools should get three -year -old, broad bridges where students with a variety of capacities are together.
The then Minister of Education Dennis Wiersma (VVD) responded in agreement but did not want to make the broad bridge class compulsory, he found that too drastic for secondary education. Instead, from 2022 there was a subsidy for schools that voluntarily wanted to introduce a ‘heterogeneous’ (mixed) bridge class, of two or more levels. For example, they were able to spend that money, 100,000 euros per application, on retraining teachers to teach at different levels or the development of adapted teaching materials.
The previous cabinet wanted to make this scheme permanently and had also set aside money for it: 55.5 million euros per year. But the Cabinet Schoof cuts back on education and has stopped this subsidy. The coalition is not convinced that a wide bridge class is good for all students. VMBO students may offer it an opportunity to attract classmates, but students with a clear VWO profile inhibits it, they think.
Roofing classes
Since this year, schools will no longer receive a subsidy for mixing students with different school advice in a first year. Interest groups for education, such as the VO council, feared that schools would stop quickly. Not without reason: before the subsidy was established, the mixed first year, which had existed for decades, was on its return. Thanks to the subsidy, the number of mixed bridging classes increased again, figures from the Education Executive Agency (DUO) showed.
The Copernicus School Community has no plans to stop the mixed bridge classes, says school director Hinke. His school had it long before the subsidy scheme. Every year, 240 new students register at the school, which now has around 1150 students. They are spread over about ten so -called ‘roof tile classes’: MAVO/HAVO and HAVO/VWO. Hinke: “All students in such a bridging class are offered the same curriculum, but they are partly differentiated to level. They all take the same tests and then their figures are calculated on two levels. For VWO you have to show more insight into the material.”
In the MAVO/HAVO bridge class he sees many students ‘up’. “We have relatively many students who come in with MAVO advice but eventually get their diploma at HAVO level.” Although the opposite also occurs. “We try to get the most out of every student, whatever it is,” says Hinke.
In addition to the roof tile classes, there is a separate VWO bridge class for students who have received a ‘single’ VWO advice in primary school. In fact, Hinke does not really need such a separate VWO bridge class, but there is a demand for it, he says. “The thought of some parents is that as a VWO student you will be lacking if you are in a broader first year.” The “real VWO-Plus students”, as he calls them, do not opt for the Copernicus. They go to one of the two Gymnasia in Hoorn.
Risk
Sometimes a student who flows from the mixed first year to VWO does not manage at that level. Hinke: “We want to give students who are motivated a chance. That means that you sometimes take a risk. That makes our VWO department more vulnerable than in other schools.” He thinks it is a shame that schools are settled by the Education Inspectorate if students stay on it once or ‘flow off’ to a lower level. “We think it is more important to find the most suitable place for our students.”
In the time that Saartje de Wit was in the HAVO/VWO bridge class, it took another two years. In the meantime, the Copernicus has even introduced a third bridge year. The school received a subsidy for this when that scheme was still there. “We mainly used that budget to give the teachers hours to develop their lessons on two levels,” says Hinke.
Such an extra bridge year is useful for some of the third -division team. Hinke: “It is often students whose we think they can do well VWO, but who are still uncertain about it themselves. And sometimes it is students who really want to do VWO but just don’t get it. They can try it for another year.”