Am Sonntag 28 September 2008 schrieb Rishab Aiyer Ghosh: > On Sun, 2008-09-28 at 02:15 +0530, . wrote: > > Maybe the government should make it mandatory and ensure > > education for all by going the German way - Free state education > > for every kid, irrespective of gender, right up to the PHD level.
As a German living in Germany and having 4 kids, I would like to correct the statement: in Germany, sending kids to school is basically free, but still costs quite a bit. We spend several 100s of Euro each year for our school going kids. These are expenditures that are raised by the school individually, for fotocopies and other material, for school books and for some specials provided to the kids etc. Going to university is then connected with higher costs: our son who is studying engineering has to pay almost 800 Euro every semester (i.e. we have to pay it). He has to pay separately for food (it's comparatively cheep, though), and living cost is not included, of course. He can still stay at home, but if he would live elsewhere, we would have to spend additionally some 500 Euro, maybe even more, per month. That are amounts which many parents can't afford. The so called BAfoeG (some support by the government) is partly (about 50%) a loan which has to be paid back after a certain time when the studies are completed. It is not given to everyone. If parents earn sufficiently, you don't get it. If the student has some money saved (more than 5000 Euro), he has to spend everything that goes beyond that limit before he is considered worthy to receive BAfoeG. Regards Martin -- Dr. Martin Senftleben, Ph.D. http://www.drmartinus.de http://www.daskirchenjahr.de
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