For anyone whose been in Germany for a long time....and educated....you always come across educated Germans who immediately let you know that you just aren’t in their category of “educated and certified”. Yes, you might have a four-year degree, or even a master’s degree....but you simply don’t measure up.
Part of this revolves around the rules or standards that the German federal government uses....but’s also a general mental note that they make of auslanders....they are less....no matter how educated they are.
This week...the German government announced that they plan to make acceptance of foreign academic qualifications easier for immigrants. There will be a legal process where external documents and degrees are examined....and then given a “stamp” of sorts.
Reasoning? Well....they are becoming very focused on the shortage of high technology skills and abilities that the German university system simply can’t churn out. If you want just a good basic degree in history....it’s no problem. If you want just a good basic degree in computer science principals....it’s no problem. Beyond that....with a fast paced technology world....the university system of Germany can’t stay up to par.
An issue occurs now with nursing......where so many German nurses are leaving the country.....for better pay....and the German hospitals are recruiting nurses from third world countries to make up for the problem of limited nurses in the country.
The curious thing about this....while the government might change....people don’t. So if you are standing there....with a doctoral degree....chatting with Germans and hand out a business card with it listed....you get a smirk of sorts. Even if you spent eight years at Harvard....you really don't have the same doctoral degree as Germans.
Some things will never change.
1 comment:
I worked in accounting in Germany with my degree from the USA. I had many colleagues over the years who thought they were better educated than I was.
We had to do simple regression analysis to determine what a taxpayer's hypothetical tax would have been had he/she stayed in the US. I had to teach EVERY one of them how to do this. Any freshman business major in the USA is required to do this.
When they complained that Americans are ignorant of Europe I'd always ask them who the leaders of China or India were. They're the two biggest countries in the world but not a single one could name the leaders. University graduates. Arbitur holders. The cream of the crop. It seems they might not be as superior to the Amis as they thought. When the PISA studies were released and Germany and the US were tied statistically I thought they'd pick up on that.
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