A recent survey revealed that 22% of Vienna’s pupils require additional tuition during the summer months.

The survey, conducted by the Foresight research centre for the Vienna Chamber of Labour during the 2023-2024 school year, polled 1,021 parents with a total of 1,277 schoolchildren.

The findings indicate that 14% of these children attend paid tutoring sessions despite the availability of free options, such as summer schools, with parents spending an average of €290.

The Vienna Chamber of Labour highlights that the situation places an extra financial burden on parents during the summer holidays, which are already costly due to external childcare and holiday camps. Single parents are particularly affected by these expenses.

“School must take place at school – and not at the kitchen table or in expensive tutoring centres,” Ilkim Erdost, Head of Education at the Vienna Chamber of Labour, said in a statement.

Erdost asserts that schools must be organised and equipped to ensure that practising and learning at school is sufficient. She reiterated the demand for “more good all-day schools” and a social index for funding, through which locations facing particular challenges would receive more resources.

The chamber also calls for increased support for local authorities, which often struggle with staffing and funding for holiday childcare.