The blue memo board at the front of the classroom is covered with a jumble of pink, green and two shades of yellow notes. "These are our thematic areas sorted by country", explains the project leader jochen hummrich-welt from ernestinum high school. 50 students from poland, the czech republic, hungary and coburg have been thinking about the topics to be covered in the next two years by the four partner schools in krakow, prague, siofok and coburg. "We are now looking at what remains and what falls out."
More than 27 member states of the european union are participating in the comenius project, an educational cooperation from 1995. It serves the purpose of european integration and understanding between the peoples of the individual countries.
Teachers and students took an entire week to organize the kick-off event for the latest project, in which young people are to deal intensively with the recent past of their countries and the fall of the iron curtain. Topics such as the secret police, relations between the countries after 1989, communism and the prague spring fall into the category of politics and history. But the young europeans also want to focus on the arts, culture and music. "At the end of the two-year project, a brochure in four languages is to be published", jirko heinz, a teacher at a grammar school in prague, describes the goal.
One topic, for example, is "tuzex". Karolina bukovska (18) from the czech republic explains what is meant by this: "there was a shortage of clothes and jeans in our school. Tuzex is a business where payment was made with vouchers. There was a line of people."
all students and teachers speak german, there are no communication problems. "Almost every school at ernestinum has hosted a guest student", figures rieka rittsteiger and sophia ernst from coburg. "In this way the guests could get to know the german culture even better and had a family connection right away." a tight program kept the participants busy during the whole week: the visit of the city and the veste, vierzehnheiligen, banz monastery, bamberg, weimar as well as the concentration camp in buchenwald were on the program as well as a french evening in seblach, a visit of the landestheater and even a french mini language course. "The week was very strenuous", say the two schoolgirls, but they are just as enthusiastic about the project as the guests and teachers.
One hour later, the memo board looks completely different: it is clearly sorted, the young europeans have worked fast. In the following two years, the topics that remain are dealt with intensively. "Every country gets a turn as host", says jirko heinz. "But it will not always be the same students who are there." the next meeting will probably take place in prague next spring, followed in october by krakow, and in early 2014 the ernestines will be guests at the partner school in siofok, hungary.
"We teachers liked the 20. Include the twenty-first century", says anna maria kyziol, teacher of german and social sciences in cracow. If there was time, they would also be happy to go into more detail about the medieval history of their respective countries. "In krakow, many poles, hungarians and germans have lived together peacefully. This was, so to speak, the first european community."

"Ludwig mosbacher jg lived here. Deported in 1874 murdered in 1942 krasnystaw" and "here lived luise mosbacher geb. Comb jg. Deported in 1876 murdered in 1942 in krasnystaw": while one car after the other rolls by in bahnhofstrabe 13, the eleventh graders alexandra and anna recite the life story of the couple murdered by the national socialists. Several times they had to interrupt, because their words were lost in the traffic. Unimpressed by all this, gunter demnig, kneeling on the ground, lays the two stumbling stones.

They were rooted here in their beloved homeland for centuries, until they became victims of expulsion and murder after the takeover: families of the jewish faith from kronach, for whom everything changed after 1933. More than 70 years after the end of the second world war and after the last jewish inhabitants of kronach were deported, the kronach synagogue action group wants to bring the fates of those jewish families to life for the population: by laying so-called stolpersteine (stumbling stones).

Rehearsals are in full swing and are coming to an end with the first performance of the play "junggesellenabschied" on 22. Marz on the stage in the old school in breitenbach. The actors of the breitenbach/mitgenfeld theater group had a total of 25 rehearsals between the end of last year and the performance of regina rosch's comedy. The dress rehearsal takes place on 21. March takes place. The spectators could be curious about the amusing play, in which the bachelor martin hauslein does not have it easy. For years, his mother paula has been nagging him day and night with her desire for a daughter-in-law from a good family. This should also be as well-to-do as possible. Father ferdinand and his friend alfons are also very interested in a wedding that is as quick as possible. They want to use the opportunity to organize a real party among men at the bachelor party again. And finally paula's birthday is approaching, which, as in previous years, seems to be under a bad star. Apart from a frying pan and a saucepan, ferdinand can't think of a suitable gift. And even paula's greatest wish will not come true: manfred has not yet found a girlfriend willing to marry him. But then something completely surprising happens …

The amateur actors are concentrated at work, they perform the play almost without the help of the prompter sigrid kleinhenz, because they are experienced and almost all of them have been with the group since its founding in 1995. Berthold heil says that people like to use pieces by regina rosch "because they are well received by the audience and exhilarate the senses. We already have enough dramas", so heil, there is cheerful in between absolutely announced. "Only at the village anniversaries in mitgenfeld and breitenbach did we play pieces by other authors", sums up berthold heil.

Werner hochstetter tell me where the bees are… The announcement made by lissy dorfler-christa, representative of the litzendorf insect friends project group, to the town council sounded dramatic: around 67 percent of the insects are no longer there, which in turn results in a significant decline in the field bird and hedgehog population. Meanwhile, half of the species are on the red list of endangered species, which is why the diversity of the flora is also endangered. "The corona crisis is a pittance against pandemics that are yet to come", according to the federation’s nature conservation activist.

The "stepping stone concept, which does not provide for a contiguous protected area, but rather a network of "biotope islands", should be the goal. In connection with the creation of compensation areas, the aim is to counteract the loss of species. About 100 hours of work were spent on 1500 square meters of compensation areas.

The city of habfurt has to put up containers, ebelsbach has a castle. The heating is on, and the best lunchtime supervision you could wish for is ready. It wasn't quite that easy, but the main valley community is actually coping very well with the general increase in the number of children at the schools.

The school childcare center, which is run by the protestant church, was able to move from the old janitor's apartment, which had become too small, to what was once "the best elementary school in bavaria": the gleisenau castle. The head of the facility, julia schatzlein-sennert, very much hopes that it will be the "nicest school childcare facility in bavaria" remains.

"I call one, two, three. Her calls?", michael hirschel asks the kids looking at him expectantly in the school gymnasium in tettau, before he gets a thunderous "mucke ab" from all the throats returns. Whenever there is this morning "mucke ab" the boys and girls from tettau and the first and second graders from steinbach am wald made the hall tremble.

With "light with red cheeks and many a bead of sweat on their foreheads, but always with shining eyes, the elementary school students showed in their final presentation what they had learned that morning – and that was a lot of lively dancing to hot hits from the charts. For this, their numerous spectators – proud parents, grandparents and younger siblings – started one la-ola wave after the other.

According to a survey, the population and parents are more than skeptical about whether schools in germany are prepared for possible renewed corona-related lockdowns. Baden-wurttemberg was the last state to start the new school year on monday.

The digital industry association bitkom published a representative survey on the same day. The burgers gave it an average grade of only 4.3 when asked how prepared they thought schools would be to maintain classes in the event of another lockdown. Parents of school-age children even awarded only a "poor" (4.6).

Two restaurateurs from french switzerland rock this year's schlossgartenfest in erlangen: peter hubschmann from ebermannstadt and marcus muller from veilbronn. "I am so happy that we have new and motivating restaurateurs", says ursula ertl, who is responsible for the conception, coordination and realization of the festival on the 30th of june. June is responsible. Because the friedrich-alexander-university erlangen-nurnberg (FAU) is celebrating 275 years this year. Anniversary. That's why the palace garden festival, which will be held under the motto "the world as a guest in erlangen", is to be a great success will also be very special. "We expect about 5000 guests", tells ursula ertl. What's new this year is that anyone can buy tickets for the event, not just people connected to the university. "The look will also be new", reports peter hubschmann. For example, the tent will be spared and there will be an aubergewohnliches lichterfest.

The two restaurateurs have formed a joint venture and want to inspire their guests with a global culinary concept. There will be delicacies from the traditional french cuisine, but also asian or mediterranean delicacies. "It will be a great experience, because there is something for everyone, from pretzels to fillet steak. And I have come up with some very special desserts", tells cake chef marcus muller who is excited about the new challenge. Burger stations and cocktail bars are also planned. "However, the favorite burger of a dear friend of mine, the carp burger, will not be available", says muller with a smile. And peter hubschmann adds that this year, four small breweries from the region will be serving their beer instead of a large one. There will even be a jubilee beer made to the recipe of FAU students, which will also be distributed later. Further hubschmann reports that they will use regional organic products of high quality. "So that our guests can feel safe, we have set up a huge security concept", tells ursula ertl. On sunday there will be a big family day in the palace garden and in the following week there will be a beer garden operation. "That is also new this year. We leave the beer bar there, serve beer and offer beer garden snacks," says hubschmann, reports hubschmann, who has already organized many rough events. One even in the harbor of the greek island of rhodes.

A winter storm with snow, rain and ice affected large parts of germany on wednesday – and now a storm is moving in as well.

Drivers skidded on wednesday, buses with schoolchildren and trucks overturned, highways were closed at times. For this thursday the german weather service warns of heavy gales and thunderstorms. At higher altitudes, deep "friederike" can also reach hurricane strength.

The historical personalities of the rakoczy festival are just like in real life. All people are the same, but some are more equal. Some of the figures that bad kissingen presents every year as witnesses to its world spa era stand out: the prince and the queen of the springs, sisi of course, and with fine nuances the wittelsbach family. Among the gentlemen in black tails, one stands in the foreground: prince bismarck.

For almost three decades, alexander karl gave character to the memory of the historical figure of the iron spa guest at the kissinger's rude homecoming celebration. Now, in the style of a famous bismarck cartoon, we have to say that the pilot has left the ship. Alexander karl died after a long and serious illness.