Stefan Ziegenhagen is Chair of the Board of Governors of St George’s International School. The Board of Governors is responsible for upholding the aims and objectives of the school, setting the strategic direction and ensuring the school has the required resources and financing to operate effectively.
Can you introduce St George’s International School to our readers in a few words?
St George’s began as many international schools do, with a handful of primary students and 3 dedicated staff. Opening in Bonnevoie in 1990, it flourished, moving into ever larger premises and opening a Secondary section. In the mid-2000s the school with the help of the Ville de Luxembourg and the Luxembourg government identified and built the School’s permanent site at Hamm. In just under 35 years, the school has grown from its original 12 students to around 850 students up to year 13, supported by 220 academic and administrative staff.
St George’s offers a British style curriculum with a distinctive international flavor. We offer the international GCSEs and international A-levels (including some BTEC courses). Our student and staff are diverse, representing over 70 nationalities, with many of our pupils speaking English as a second or additional language. We celebrate the joy of learning, fostering perseverance and resilience. Our focus is on educating the whole child – academically, socially and emotionally. Our students achieve excellent exam results, giving our students access to outstanding opportunities in higher education in Luxembourg and the world.
We have worked hard to shake off any reputation of being purely a “British School”. While the school is rightly proud of the heritage of its British-style curriculum and pedagogy, it is increasingly as Luxembourgish as it is international in its outlook and strategic direction.
Private international schools such as St George’s play a pivotal role in attracting the best internationally qualified talent to the country, thereby contributing significantly to Luxembourg’s wealth as a whole. Over the past two decades, the pressures on Luxembourg to attract talent in all sectors have increased exponentially. Luxembourg has become one of the most difficult places in the world to which to recruit and in which to accommodate the many high and medium level employees on which such an economy depends. These demands are especially high given the country’s role as an international hub in the finance, fund, insurance, technology and space sectors, not to mention the human resource-heavy European institutions based in Luxembourg.
It is my firm belief that St George’s is one of the best schools in Luxembourg, and the board of Governors would like to keep it that way. Not just for the benefit of our pupils and our parents, but also for Luxembourg.
What are some of the most important challenges and objectives of the board at present, over the next year and beyond?
When I was a student myself 40 years ago, the everyday use of a calculator would have been considered the latest technology, yet now Artificial Intelligence (AI) is poised again to transform the way we are learning. Giving our students the right tools to thrive as adults will be a huge challenge: they must ready themselves for an uncertain future and will need the tools of our times to do so successfully. We need to future-proof our school.
St. George’s has long been at the cutting edge of international education, attracting some of the very best teaching talent from across the world to Luxembourg, a pool from which English language public schools in Luxembourg benefit when our staff are ready for a new challenge but do not want to leave the country. With this in mind, the school is looking to become a beacon of excellence in terms of teacher training and accreditation worldwide.
St. George’s is seeking to expand its role as one of the Luxembourg Ministry of Education’s critical, independent friends, a partner and a resource in building the future of education in Luxembourg together with all Luxembourg stakeholders. To this end, we need to ensure that St George’s remains firmly embedded as an integral part of the Luxembourg educational landscape.
What has the launch of English language schools within the Luxembourg public school system meant for St George’s?
The 2016 initiative of the previous government to introduce English-medium education in public schools was very welcome and has led to an increase in the number of English language school places. At the same time, the gap between free public schooling and fee-based private education – in terms of the quality of teaching and of the curriculum, student safeguarding and student support – has continued to exist, or even widened. However, what hasn’t changed is the law on the financing of private schools, which dates from 2003. And that has led to an increasing inequity for parents coming to work to Luxembourg who choose to pay the fees for a higher quality of education for their children, and who are then charged an additional premium for most of the facilities and services that come free with enrolment in a public school (Maisons Relais, crèches et foyers scolaires, school buses, school books, meals, music lessons, special educational needs cover, examination fees etc.).
We are currently working with the Ministry of Education to addressing this issue. They are very supportive, but there remains a strong argument that the law on the financing of private schools could benefit from a significant overhaul, to better reflect the substantial changes in the Luxembourg educational landscape over the past 20 years.
In addition to tuition costs paid by parents, what degree of government funding do you have and are you satisfied in terms of amount of funding and fairness?
To be very clear, Luxembourg, in comparison to other jurisdictions, has a very generous regime of subsidies, and St George’s has benefited from this as it grew from a small, expat, primary school to the K-12 international school it is today. In 2023, the operational subsidy amounted to €5.5m, covering part of the school’s €18.4m operational expenditure.
This clearly helps but represents only a fraction of the enormous financial resources and budgets available to the public sector schools in Luxembourg overall. With inflationary pressures increasing year on year, our fee-paying parents face a growing financial burden, even without the additional fees charged for services that are free in the public school system. This removes an important incentive for highly skilled workers to move to Luxembourg, as it penalizes them for seeking high-quality education for their children.
For some reason, there is this myth that private schools in Luxembourg and St George’s, in particular, are somehow the domain of the wealthy. But let me tell you that our typical parent profile consists of two spouses, both working full-time in middle management or higher high skilled positions , who still often struggle to finance a high-quality education for their offspring – in addition to the inflationary challenges of housing and other expenses. They also carry a significant portion of the country’s income tax burden. This inequity affects precisely the high skilled, middle management talent that businesses in Luxembourg are so keen to attract.
What percentage of students are children of Luxembourg citizens born in this county and why do these parents pay the costs to send their children to St Georges rather than taking advantage of the public-school free offerings?
St George’s has a substantial number of students with Luxembourg nationality, and many of our international parents have or have adopted Luxembourg citizenship in addition to their nationality of birth. In addition, and for good reason, St George’s is well frequented by Luxembourg’s bubbling international community. Irrespective of their nationality, our parents have made the decision to seek the highest quality possible of education for their children. Meanwhile, St George’s has long been proud to rise to the challenge of meeting those high expectations.
Are there any final thoughts you’d like to share?
When businesses seek to bring in highly skilled workers from outside Luxembourg, and even beyond the EU, they encounter recurrent obstacles. Securing affordable housing and finding top-quality education for their children are the primary concerns. Although this is, thankfully, starting to change, the traditional education system in Luxembourg has long hindered the recruitment of foreign talent, except for a select group of francophone individuals.
All of this highlights the critical role of the Luxembourg government in supporting institutions like St. George’s School. And that begs the question: how can the government support the private school sector in order to better support Luxembourg’s existing and emerging businesses?
Following last year’s elections St George’s Board of Governors together with management sent a letter to political stakeholders, making it clear that we think it is time that the government recognizes again the value of private education and treats it equitably to the public schooling sector.
To do so would have a substantial impact on the strength and sustainability of the international business community – a community that AMCHAM also represents – the very community that Luxembourg is so keen to attract and support in terms of investment, new ventures, and highly skilled labor. It would also alleviate some of the financial pressures currently being felt by private school parents in Luxembourg, and by the private schools that are providing this highly sought-after education at a cost to the taxpayer substantially lower per student than the Luxembourg public schools.
We are hoping to encourage the Luxembourg government to look at the good practices of private schools, rather than risk stigmatizing the way they operate, and encourage healthy competition on a level playing field. At school as elsewhere, we believe that best practice should be encouraged, and shared.
