Because Education relies on the Family: Second Round of the Diesterweg Scholarship Comes to a Successful Close
Increasing educational opportunities, helping children and parents, and supporting life and learning as a family: these are the goals of the Diesterweg Scholarship Darmstadt. Named after the education reformer Adolph Diesterweg, the support program was conceptually developed by the Foundation of the Polytechnical Society of Frankfurt and is based on the idea of using the strength of the family to achieve scholastic success.
The goal of the family education scholarship is to assist fourth grade students with a high learning potential but with difficult starting conditions, specifically helping them prepare for the transition to secondary school. The Software AG Foundation (SAGST) brought the scholarship to Darmstadt in 2013; the program's contents were developed by the association Sprachpuzzle e.V. The students, together with their siblings and parents, receive two years of support and counselling, including an extracurricular program for learning, cultural activities, care, and freetime activities.
On April 22, the second round of the program came to a close. With 19 events, the program had 80 participants from 16 families, who come from six different parts of Darmstadt and represent 13 different countries of origin.
“The second generation of scholarship recipients also successfully completed the transition from elementary school to secondary schools,” happily reported project coordinator Dr. Ulrike Landzettel from the Diakonisches Werk Darmstadt-Dieburg. “This is reason enough to celebrate together with families, siblings, and supporters and to look back at the two exciting years that were made possible by the financial assistance of the Software AG Foundation and the Dotter Foundation.” SAGST project manager Jana Weische noted, “During this time, the extracurricular project partners and the Diesterweg team did an especially excellent job.”
In regular workshops and excursions, as well as through individual counseling, employees, volunteers, honorary staff, and student assistants worked to familiarize the scholarship holders and their families with the German school system. They taught learning techniques and provided informal learning opportunities at their place of residence. Jana Weische notes, “These are experiences that benefit not just the younger siblings. The parents become valuable sources of advice for friends and relatives, as well - this has been observed in cities like Frankfurt am Main, Hamburg, and Hannover, where the program has already been in place for a longer time.”
In Darmstadt, the Diesterweg scholarship start its third round in autumn. The selection of scholarship holders will be completed by the beginning of the summer holidays.
You can read more about the Diesterweg Scholarship here.