The Comprehensive School--A Reform Model in Contradiction.

A few figures will give a quick orientation on the comprehensive schools: the first integrated comprehensive school in the Federal Republic was opened in 1968. There are currently (1986) 243 integrated comprehensive schools (ICS) in the state school system (see [2, p. 32]). If in addition one includes the 200 cooperative comprehensive schools (CCS) (see [1, p. 235]) the number of state comprehensive schools in the Federal Republic will soon be 450.1 If at the same time one also considers that in 1986 there were more than 32,000 schools providing general education in the Federal Republic, the minority position of the comprehensive school becomes clear: 5.7 percent of all seventh graders attended an integrated comprehensive school in 1984-1985, and 4.4 percent attended a cooperative one. This means, in other words, as before, 90 percent of pupils in the Federal Republic attend a school of the traditional type (Hauptschule, Realschule, and Gymnasium). The table shows how the Federal states diverge from these...