# Public high schools near Leverkusen



## JennieH (Oct 30, 2016)

Hi Everyone

It is likely that my family will be moving to Germany in the new year. My husband will be working in Leverkusen. Can anyone recommend any good public high schools around Leverkusen, Cologne, Dusseldorf or Bonn that will help my non-German speaking 12 year old integrate into the German school system?

Thanks very much
Jennie


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## *Sunshine* (Mar 13, 2016)

Your child is too old for the German system. I would strongly recommend negotiating international school fees.


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## Nononymous (Jul 12, 2011)

Agreed. At 12 with no German your child would face some serious hurdles. Germany does many things well, but integrating children without language skills into the school system isn't necessarily one of their strengths. Add to that the strains of coping with massive immigration over the past year.

At 12 not only is it much more difficult to pick up the language quickly, but children are already being streamed into the different categories of school, and Gymnasium would demand a good level of German. A "bilingual" German-English program won't be suitable, as they merely teach some subjects in English and some in German. You'd need a "dual-track" program where native English speakers can be accommodated, but the only public one I know of is the Mandela School in Berlin.

A few years ago we had thoughts of spending some time in Cologne, with our 14 year old who spoke very decent German (she'd survived half a year of Gymnasium in grade 8). I looked in the area for school options and found nothing public apart from a Gymnasium offering the IB program in English, but that's only for the final two years prior to Abitur. (Also consider distances from home to work to school since apparently traffic in that part of Germany can be pretty bad.)


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