German schoolteachers are increasingly at risk of violent aggression.
According to an analysis of the country’s police crime statistic (PKS) published by news agency dpa today, the number of severe attacks more than doubled between 2015 and 2024.
In 2024, the latest year for which numbers are available, German police counted 557 cases of severe violent crime against teachers. This category includes crimes such as murder, manslaughter, rape and grievous bodily harms.
By comparison, in 2015 only 268 such cases were counted, meaning that the number of violent attacks rose by 108 per cent.
The number of intentional simple bodily harm – attacks that do not provoke lasting damage – also rose to a new high of 1,283 cases in 2024.
The numbers were provided by the interior ministry in response to a request for information by the Greens Party.
The police statistic shows that attacks on police officers, firemen and other emergency service personnel have equally gone up.
Germany’s schools have seen a general rise in violence in the last years.
According to calculations by Schulportal, an education website, cases of violent crime at German schools have risen by almost 40 per cent between 2022 and 2024 alone, rising from circa 21,000 cases in 2021 to 29,000 cases in 2024.
While attacks on teachers receive more public scrutiny it is mostly pupils themselves who become victims of attacks by their schoolmates.
In a 2025 survey among German teachers, 47 per cent of respondents said there were problems at their schools with physical and psychological violence among their students.
In a recent gruesome case, on March 30, a 15-year-old Palestinian immigrant stabbed a 13-year-old boy in front of a school in Hamburg’s Flottbek district with a knife after a fistfight. The victim was harmed so badly that he is still in a coma and may never be able to breathe or speak independently again.
Flottbek is one of Hamburg’s most exclusive and pricy residential districts.
