150 million euro investment for new school places
The Flemish Government is to invest 150 million euro in the creation of extra school places over the next three years. The lion’s share of the investment, just under 130 million euro will go towards the creation of extra capacity in secondary schools. The remainder of the cash will go to addressing capacity issues in primary schools.
The investment was announced by the Flemish Education Minister Hilde Crevits (Christian democrat) on Friday. Since 2010, the Flemish Government has invested 372 million euro in the creation of extra capacity in pre-school and primary education. The invest is good for the creation of 40,000 extra places, 20,000 of which are already available.
However, as children get older they will also need secondary school places. Hence the decision to invest in secondary schools. A new study by Brussels Dutch-Medium University and the Catholic University of Leuven estimates that 58,500 extra places will be required by the 2024-2025 school year.
The funding for extra place will go to 27 towns, cities and municipalities. 22.7 million euro is going to secondary education in Antwerp, 12.8 million euro to Ghent, 6.3 million euro to Leuven, 5.9 million euro to Brussels, 5.8 million euro to Mechelen and 5.2 million euro to Vilvoorde.
Of the 23.1 million euro that is going to pre-school and primary education, half is going to Antwerp. The rest is going to be invested in Ghent, Brussels and the Flemish Brabant municipality of Dilbeek.