Germany's 16 States Adopt a Joint AI-in-Schools Framework (KMK Handlungsempfehlung)

Germany's Kultusministerkonferenz (KMK) — the standing conference of all 16 state (Land) education ministries — adopted a joint 'Handlungsempfehlung für die Bildungsverwaltung zum Umgang mit Künstlicher Intelligenz in schulischen Bildungsprozessen' on 10 October 2024. Nordrhein-Westfalen led the drafting through an ad hoc working group, building on a July 2024 position paper from the Standing Scientific Commission (SWK) on the future of the school education system.
The recommendation sets out five action areas: didactics (learning about and with AI, especially in German, mathematics and foreign languages); exam culture (new assessment formats that credit AI-related competencies, with teachers retaining exclusive authority over final grades even where AI assists review); teacher training (mandatory AI competency and risk-assessment content across all three phases of German teacher education); regulation (building on the EU AI Act, GDPR and German Ethics Council guidance, with states committing to unified standards via the Digitalpakt); and equity (a commitment to free, data-protection-compliant access to large language models and state-operated, education-specific AI systems for all students).
The framework leaves some questions explicitly open: unlike the SWK's recommendation to begin structured AI use from grade 8, the KMK described restricting AI use in primary schools as still 'open for discussion' among the states. North Rhine-Westphalia has since launched a concrete pilot under the framework, KIMADU (AI in Mathematics and German instruction), beginning 1 February 2025.

Read the full analysis: https://deutsches-schulportal.de/bildungswesen/laender-einigen-sich-auf-empfehlungen-zum-umgang-mit-ki-in-schulen/