Modern apprenticechips aid German economy.

Germany's apprenticeship program is one answer to a growing problem. Even as the world financial system stabilizes, unemployment among young people is soaring. In Spain, some 39% of under-25-year-olds are jobless, up from 26% a year ago. Ten other European Union countries including France, Belgium, and Hungary have youth unemployment rates above 20%. In the U.S., the unemployment rate for 16- to 24-year-olds has climbed to over 18%, up from 13% a year ago.

The danger is that a generation of young people may be economically scarred for years. Studies suggest that an extended period of youthful joblessness can significantly depress lifetime income as people get stuck in low-end jobs, or come to be seen by employers as damaged goods. "The longer they are out of work, the harder it becomes.

In Germany, by contrast, under-25 joblessness was 8.2% in September, just a tick above the overall German rate of 8%. Austria, Denmark, and Switzerland also have well-established apprenticeship programs and below-average youth unemployment. Rather than being left to flounder after high school, young workers are plugged right into the labor market.

German companies are happy with the system, too. Apprenticeships give employers several years to train workers in company-specific skills and assess the abilities of an Azubi—short for Auszubildener ("trainee"). Says Günther Hohlweg, who oversees the 10,000 young people learning trades at Munich-based electronics and engineering giant Siemens: "When they're done, they can start on a higher level."

The system is even good for the national budget, because companies bear much of the cost of secondary-school education. German authorities accredit some 350 kinds of apprenticeship, ranging from baker to hair stylist and bank clerk to video editor. Even university students may be apprentices, splitting their time between studying and practical experience in fields such as biotech or aerospace.

Lately, though, the system has come under stress through factors related to both the current downturn and long-term changes in the global labor market. The number of apprenticeships slumped more than 10% between 2000 and 2005, recovering only after the government threatened to compel companies to take more trainees. German officials expect the number to dip again this year because of the financial crisis. Although apprentices in lower-skilled trades can serve as cheap labor, they are often an expense to their employers in the short term. Siemens (SI) spends about $220 million a year training Azubis, some of whom earn as much as $1,500 a month. The company estimates that the productive work done by the trainees equals only about one-third their cost. Siemens, which offers almost all its apprentices full-time jobs, recoups the investment only later.

The biggest problem is a shortage of work for teens who complete only basic schooling, which may end after the ninth grade. Germany's highly automated factories offer far fewer low-skilled jobs than they used to. As a result, more than half the graduates of basic schooling wind up in government-supported training programs.

At the same time, some industries take on too many apprentices. Hair salons, for example, can profit from the cheap labor that trainees provide. So they tend to train more hairdressers than the market can absorb. Once young people have invested years learning a trade, it's tough to start over. Germany is much less successful retraining older workers than training young ones.

Goethe German language institute pushes for greater multilingualism in Europe

The Goethe Institute, Germany's language and culture institute, continues to boost awareness of the importance of multilingualism. Experts say a lack of knowledge of foreign languages in Europe is hurting the economy.

The latest involvement by the Goethe Institute in promoting the learning of foreign languages is an event called "Languages without Borders" which premiered in Berlin. It is one of around 30 projects around the world that the Goethe Institute has financed in the past two years in an effort to promote multilingualism.

"We believe that with such projects, we can put a spotlight on the issue of multilingualism, and then later we can pinpoint a strategy of how we're going to improve multilingualism next year or the year after that," said Matthias Makowski, head of the language department at the Goethe Institute.

"Languages without Borders" was established to raise awareness of the importance of multilingualism in modern times, according to Makowski.

Since 2007, the European Union has had a Commission for Multilingualism, to strengthen language diversity. In comparison to other continents - or even individual countries - Europe falls short. For example, India alone has 22 official languages. This makes it easy for people there to become multilingual, said Anil Bhatti, a German language professor in New Delhi.

"What you have in Europe is a situation where multilingualism is attained through the learning of foreign languages," Bhatti said. "In India, somebody from the north, who speaks Hindi, wouldn't consider Tamil a foreign language. This is just another Indian language. Learning a foreign language means learning a European language, for example. And for an Indian person, this could be their fourth or fifth language."

To speak four or five languages is now the exception in Europe. Today, as immigration to Europe grows, language plays a key role in the integration of new arrivals. In the EU, many countries require immigrants to submit to language testing.

However, Piet van Avermaet from the Association of Language Testing in Europe is skeptical about making such tests compulsory.

"When you take language as a condition for integration, it often does not work. It's often the other way around," van Avermaet said. "When you reduce the problems of discrimination when you improve the opportunities for people to find a job; when you improve your policy in relation to social integration then at the same time the process of language acquisition emerges."

A lack of knowledge of foreign languages can even affect the economy, according to a study led by the EU Commission. In 2006, it found that at least 945,000 small and medium-sized companies may be losing business due to a lack of language competence.

Germany pushes for Afghan Troop Withdrawl

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier wants to create the conditions for an international troop withdrawal from Afghanistan within four years, his spokesman said.

Aides to Steinmeier, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s main challenger in Sept. 27 elections, have drafted 10 points for a possible pullout accord with the Afghan government, Foreign Ministry spokesman Jens Ploetner told reporters in Berlin today.

While Steinmeier won’t set a specific pullout date, he defined “a worthwhile aim over the next four years, and that worthwhile aim is to set conditions to begin an international withdrawal,” Ploetner said.

Afghanistan is heating up the election campaign after a German commander ordered a NATO air strike that may have killed civilians. Two tanker trucks seized by Taliban militants were targeted in the Sept. 4 strike, killing scores of people in an area where International Security Assistance Force troops are under German command.

The German Foreign Ministry plan includes possibly withdrawing about 500 German troops from the city of Faizabad by 2011 and turning the base into a training camp for local security forces, the German magazine Der Spiegel reports in this week’s edition.

Germany should “create the foundation for withdrawal from Afghanistan” during parliament’s next term, which runs for four years, Der Spiegel cited the position paper as saying. Polls show a majority of voters oppose Germany’s military engagement in Afghanistan.

Hitler teaching safe sex??

A German AIDS awareness group has come under fire for posting an online video that starts off with a young couple having sex in an apartment before revealing the male to be a grinning Adolf Hitler.

Its closing message: "AIDS is a mass murderer."

On Tuesday, a prominent German Jewish group and AIDS prevention advocates demanded the ad be withdrawn.

"It is disgusting and we're asking the producers of the campaign to pull it back," said Joerg Litwinschuh of German AIDS Assistance, an awareness group.

He said the ad, commissioned by Regenbogen, German for rainbow, seemed designed for little more than shock value and was offensive to people who have HIV.

"We denounce this ad. I can say that absolutely," said Volker Mertens, a spokesman for another group, the German AIDS Foundation.

Stephan Kramer, general secretary of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, issued a statement calling the ad "a defamation and mockery" of Holocaust victims.

On Monday, Regenbogen deputy head Heiko Schoessling said the ad would run on German TV and in movie theaters. He said the "mass murder" campaign would also include radio spots, music videos, print ads and posters featuring former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and former Soviet leader Josef Stalin.

The next day, as criticism mounted, Regenbogen spokesman Jan Schwertner said plans for the video and the broader campaign were not final. Talks with TV stations and theaters are continuing, he said, but would not disclose when and where the ads would appear.

Until recently, Germans resisted taking creative liberties with Hitler as they reckoned with the horrors of the Nazi past. But as the World War II generation dwindles, that resistance is fading.

Two years ago, when a Swiss Jewish director portrayed Hitler as a comical dolt in "Mein Fuehrer: The Truly Truest Truth about Adolf Hitler," many reviewers dismissed the movie as bad cinema but didn't recoil at the treatment of the Fuehrer as comedy. This spring, a German-language version of the Broadway hit musical "The Producers" — replete with swastikas and goose-stepping storm troopers — had a moderately successful run in Berlin.

Germany voices opposition to Google Books

First, three major U.S.-based companies railed against the Google Books settlement. Now an entire country says nein! The German government filed a complaint in U.S. courts yesterday warning lawmakers that the Google Books deal could have an international impact on copyright law, privacy, and the rights of German authors.

In 2005, Google enmeshed itself in a bad scene when it scanned millions of out-of-print works without author permission. The Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers balked, Google coughed up $125 million, and here we are.

Though the Google settlement only applies in the U.S., Germany contends that its precedent will affect other countries.

"Once the database is posted, Internet users even in Germany will have access to the Google Books Search by using a freely accessible U.S. proxy server," said Theodore C. Max, the German government's lawyer. "In other words, even if the digital book database is entirely localized within the United States, it will still be available for search requests from Germany."

Now that Germany has paved the way, other countries may take a similar view.

German classes take deep cuts

Foreign language education in the US has taken another hit as Carolina education departments cut back. Marilyn Metzler, a German language teacher sees enrollment in her German classes fluctuate each year. But now she's more worried than ever about the future of the program -- and her job.

For the first time since the language program's start over a decade ago, German classes will no longer be offered in Chapel Hill-Carrboro middle schools. High school German has also been slashed, with some schools combining class levels and others losing all courses in the language.

While Metzler's program at Chapel Hill High remains mostly intact, she said she's worried that cuts to other German programs mean the school board will soon want to say "auf Wiedersehen" to the language altogether.

It's not just happening at Chapel Hill-Carrboro, either. To make up for severe cuts in the state budget this year, school districts across the Triangle have been forced to reduce electives that school boards and principals once proudly touted. Teachers and other employees are being cut.

"I understand that budgets are affecting programs," said Metzler, 57. "But I hate to think money is the single, defining issue in determining what students can learn."

Although the district is cutting German from middle school, an upper-level class will remain at Smith Middle School for eighth graders who want to continue the language in high school. Metzler is teaching the section.

"I was pretty devastated when I heard the news," she said. "This will affect our future numbers. Students who start the language early on are more likely to continue in high school."

East Chapel Hill High's German program has been cut entirely. Students who want to take German will either have to travel to one of Metzler's classes at Chapel Hill High, four miles away, or enroll in online courses.

"I don't want to take a foreign language online. You lose a huge chunk of instruction that way," said Micaela Arneson, a senior at East Chapel Hill High who had intended to take AP German after more than five years of instruction in both middle and high school.

Niel Lebeck, a senior at East Chapel Hill High who also wanted to continue with AP German, said part of the problem is that German has "less of a hook" than other languages. Spanish is useful, he said, because of the growing number of Hispanics in this country. And offering Japanese means the district has an Asian language, which is smart in a global economy.

Metzler doesn't like it when people say German isn't a useful language.

"There are many reasons why German is still a valid language to learn," she said. "It prepares you to be a global citizen, and it also helps you better understand how language works."

Frau Metzler, as her students call her, runs one of the best German programs in the state. In her 14 years with the school system, her students have regularly won national and state awards, scored high on exams and traveled abroad in exchange programs. Her German Honor Society students even started a German club where they taught elementary school students.

Despite her growing trophy closet, Metzler said she feels that she's being pushed away from teaching.

Mass WWII grave brings Poles, Germans together

Germans and Poles are laying ghosts of World War II to rest this week in Malbork Poland, — more than 2,000 of them.

At a ceremony Friday, they will rebury the bones that were discovered last fall in a mass grave at the foot of this northern Polish city's medieval castle, setting aside the grievances that linger from the war and often bedevil relations between the two countries.

But the uncertainties about who the dead were and who killed them may never be resolved. All that authorities can say with some assuredness is that they were probably German civilians who died in the ferocious final months of the war, in a city with a shared Polish-German past that dates back more than 700 years.

Poland and Germany are at peace today — fellow democracies in the 27-nation European Union. But the war still shadows the relationship. They argue, often bitterly, over war damages, past suffering, and the rights of an estimated 3 million ethnic Germans expelled as Poland headed into a future as a Soviet communist satellite.

Yet the grisly find by red-brick Malbork Castle seems to have drawn hearts and minds together. Polish authorities have handled the discovery with sensitivity, neither side has voiced recriminations, and discussions on where to rebury them have reached a cordial, mutually agreed conclusion.

The first bones were found in October by construction workers digging foundations for a five-star hotel by the Castle, a tourist attraction and UNESCO World Heritage site. But it took three months for the magnitude of the grave to become clear. While construction of the 175-room hotel was moved to an adjacent plot, an exhumation was ordered by Polish authorities.

Workers spent six months gently working through wet sand to amass the bones of some 2,120 men, women and children. But they found no documents, clothes or personal belongings, save for a child's pair of glasses. There also are no known witnesses to the burial.

Forensic experts and anthropologists moved in, and the evidence "indicates it is most probable that these are German civilians who died in early 1945, in February or March," says Maciej Schulz, a prosecutor at Polish state-funded Institute of National Remembrance, who investigated the mass grave.

The supposition is that they were buried in a shell crater after artillery fire demolished buildings, and that because there is no mention of the grave in Polish or German documents, it must have been filled with bodies between March and mid-May, when Soviet forces held the city.