Why does the school senator no longer want to hear about religious bullying?

Has she thrown old beliefs overboard in her new job? Education Senator Astrid-Sabine Busse (64, SPD) is apparently being put on a leash by her own authority.

For years, Neukölln has been about religious mobbing disputed: Muslim students and parents threaten and insult teachers and classmates because they allegedly do not behave in accordance with the Koran.

A study at the end of last year had made shocking examples public. A year earlier, on November 23, 2020, an open letter from educators and education experts to Sandra Scheeres (SPD), Senator for Education at the time, denounced this problem. It said: “The Berlin schools need a qualified offer of support in order to take effective action against religious bullying, confrontational expressions of religion and Islamist ideologization.” There are daily disputes.

The letter is signed by Busse, then head of the elementary school in the Köllnische Heide and head of the Association of Berlin School Boards.

The 2020 open letter addresses religious bullying in schools.  Today's Senator for Education, Astrid-Sabine Busse, also signed (Photo: .)
The 2020 open letter addresses religious bullying in schools. Today’s Senator for Education, Astrid-Sabine Busse, also signed (Photo: .)

When the Neukölln CDU MP Christopher Förster (35) asked about religious bullying, Busse let her State Secretary Alexander Slotty (38, SPD) answer. On several points, Slotty refused to answer because the term “confrontational religious practice” was allegedly “not a generally accepted scientific term with a clear definition”. “The individual reports of religiously charged conflicts do not provide sufficient data,” said the State Secretary.


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Has buses rotated 180 degrees on the subject? Your authority weighs it down: You use “the terms customary in the Senate administration,” it says at the request of the BZ. For years, the Senate has used the phrase “political and religious conflicts”.

CDU MP Christopher Förster (35) in front of Busse's former school in Neukölln (Photo: Siegfried Purschke)
CDU MP Christopher Förster (35) in front of Busse’s former school in Neukölln (Photo: Siegfried Purschke)

The CDU MP is not satisfied with this answer: “Ms. Busse should stay true to her line, not submit to party and coalition logic!”

Förster continues: “We must not close our eyes to the problem of religious bullying, it will not go away. The school peace is seriously endangered. But Ms. Busse obviously lacks the support of the party.”

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