Press releases

Educational staff are already shaping the future of tomorrow’s generation today: André Kaldenbach, Head of the Daycare and Child Care Division, emphasized this importance during his welcome address to the new recruits at the daycare centers and open all-day schools (OGS) at the Depot Talstraße: “The 56 municipal daycare centers are a central place of life and learning for around 4,000 children, where they spend most of their day. This makes it all the more important that we support them with professionally qualified, dedicated, and responsible staff. I am personally very pleased that, once again this year, we are able to guide many young people on their path to this responsible profession and benefit from their curiosity and dedication.”

This year, about 51 new trainees are beginning their careers at daycare centers and after-school care programs in the city of Aachen. Of these, 11 are PiA childcare workers and 35 are PiA early childhood educators. “Practice-Integrated Training” (PiA) means that the trainees are assigned to daycare centers from the very beginning; as a result, the number of hours of theoretical instruction at the technical college decreases year by year, while the number of practical training hours increases. In addition, five vocational interns are beginning their two-year technical college program or one-year internship.

Beate Traeger, head of the Department of Municipal Daycare Centers, encouraged the new staff members to show their commitment: “As trainees, you bring new perspectives, ideas, and questions to the day-to-day work at the daycare centers, which enriches our teams and our educational work. In this way, we create not only a learning environment for the children in our care at the local daycare centers, but also an environment that fosters mutual learning—that is, learning from one another.”