The issue remains particularly significant in Vienna.
In the 2025/26 school year, 8,408 of the 18,413 pupils in the first school level of Vienna’s public primary schools had so-called “extraordinary” status, meaning their German was deemed insufficient to keep up with regular lessons. That works out at around 45.7 percent.
What's the current system in Austria for pupils with a low level of German?
Austria has a compulsory final kindergarten year before children start school. This usually involves at least 20 hours of kindergarten attendance per week. General compulsory schooling then begins when children reach school age, normally at around six.
Because it's compulsory in Austria, school attendance doesn't depend on whether children speak German at a certain level.
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What happens then?
Your child’s German skills are also considered as part of the school enrolment and school-readiness process. If their German is not sufficient to follow lessons, the school uses the standardised MIKA-D assessment to determine their language level and whether they need additional German support.
At primary level, schools may also use a short voluntary screening known as MIKA-O during the school-readiness process. It takes about three minutes and can lead either directly to ordinary pupil status or to a more detailed assessment using MIKA-D 2.0.
From the 2026/27 school year, Austria is using a revised version known as MIKA-D 2.0.
What German skills test must schoolchildren in Austria take?
MIKA-D stands for Messinstrument zur Kompetenzanalyse - Deutsch, or German Competence Analysis Instrument. It is carried out individually by a trained member of staff at the school, and MIKA-D 2.0 takes around 20 to 30 minutes, including evaluation.
The revised test has a modular structure and looks at different aspects of German depending on the child’s age and school level.
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At primary level, these can include vocabulary, German sentence structure, understanding questions and speaking tasks such as describing something or telling a story. Reading is also assessed at the later primary-school stage.
At secondary level, the assessment covers sentence structure, listening, reading, and speaking. The revised system also allows teachers’ observations to form part of the overall assessment.
Parents who would prefer information in another language can also find official MIKA-D guidance from IQS translated into 22 languages.
What happens after they take the test?
The result determines whether the child receives ordinary (ordentlich) or extraordinary (außerordentlich) pupil status and what German-language support they need.
From the 2026/27 school year, schools have more flexibility in how they organise that support. They can continue using the standard system of separate Deutschförderklassen and Deutschförderkurse or organise German support autonomously under a language-support plan designed for their own school.
Under the standard model, Deutschförderklassen involve 15 or 20 hours of German support per week, depending on the school level, while Deutschförderkurse involve six hours per week. Children in the latter generally spend more of their time in their regular class.
Extraordinary pupil status can last up to four semesters, after which the child moves to ordinary status.
The 2026 reforms also made it easier for some children with extraordinary status to progress through school. A pupil with a MIKA-D result of mangelhaft - indicating that further German support is still needed - can move up to the next school level if the class or school conference gives a positive assessment of their likely progress. This does not apply to pupils with the lower result ungenügend.
MIKA-D has been compulsory for determining ordinary or extraordinary pupil status across Austria since 2019. Under the new rules, pupils who remain in German-language support must take one compulsory MIKA-D assessment each school year, at the end of the summer semester. Schools can also carry out an additional assessment during the year when a pupil has made sufficient progress.
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Will my child have to attend summer school?
Possibly. Since 2026, summer school has been compulsory for extraordinary-status pupils who were attending a Deutschförderklasse on the first day of the summer semester.
Their school automatically registers these children, so parents do not need to submit a separate application. Other pupils can still attend Austria’s summer school voluntarily.
Should my kid study for that test?
The Austrian government says that children do not have to study specifically for the MIKA-D test, but it is best for them to practise German in general.
According to the Education Ministry, some things that may help foreign children with their German skills include talking to people who are native German speakers and reading books in German (but, they say, you should also read to your child in your native language because the skills acquired by reading transfer to language learning).
They also recommend checking reading days and activities in public libraries, listening to audiobooks in German, and watching media in German (such as series or films).
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