Germany's Educational System
I cut, pasted, and then outlines from the first few paragraphs of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Germany .   Walter Antoniotti, 2/6/11
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I. Introduction
   A. The responsibility for the German education system lies primarily with the states (Länder) while the federal government plays only a minor role.
   B. Optional Kindergarten (nursery school) education is provided for all children between three and six years of age, after which school attendance is compulsory, in most cases for 11 to 12 years.
   C. The system varies throughout Germany because each state (Land) decides its own educational policies.
   D. German children only attend school in the morning. There is no provision for serving lunch. There is a lot more homework, heavy emphasis on the "three R's" and very few extracurricular activities.
II. Most children first attend Grundschule from the age of six to ten or 12.
III. German secondary education includes four types of school with grades up to 9 - 13  depending on the school.
Hauptschule
for vocational education

Hauptschulabschluss exam
after grade 9 or 10 or
Realschulabschluss exam
(average Maturity)
after grade 10 		Realschule
broader range intermediate pupils

Mittlere Reife exam
after grade 10		 Gymnasium
for university education
Abitur exam
after grade 12 or 13.		 Gesamtschule  
(combines the three )

 

 

 

There are also Förderschulen/Sonderschulen.
One in 21 pupils attends a Förderschule.[2][3]

Nevertheless the Förderschulen/Sonderschulen
can also lead, in special circumstances, to a 
Hauptschulabschluss of both type 10a or type 
10b, the latter of which is the Realschulabschluss.
IV. University education is very low-cost or free higher beyond a German Abitur.
      1. Many of Germany's hundred or so institutions charge little or no tuition.
      2. Students must prove through examinations that they are qualified.
           a. Students are, as a rule, required to have passed the Abitur examination;
           b. Since 2009, however, those with a Meisterbrief (master craftman's diploma) have 
               also been able to apply.[4][5]
           c. Those wishing to attend a "university of applied sciences" must, as a rule,
                have Abitur, Fachhochschulreife or a Meisterbrief.
           d. Pupils are eligible to enter a university or university of applied sciences if they 
              can present additional proof that they will be able to keep up with their fellow 
              students (see: Begabtenprüfung and ochbegabtenstudium)
http://www.educationalpolicy.org/pdf/global2005.pdf Germany has two types of colleges, University and University of Applied Science.
I do not know if the 13% figure is just University. Clarification wanted-mail   Walter Antoniotti, Is Germany at risk of a shortage of university graduates and, as a result, a shortage of highly qualified skilled workers? The figures that the OECD published in the study "Education at a Glance" in the autumn of 2008 caused a stir because they gave Germany poor marks for tertiary education. According to these statistics, only 21.2% of the typical age cohort completed a tertiary programme in 2006. The average for all OECD countries isb 37.2%. http://www.kooperation-international.de/en/oecd/themes/info/detail/data/

V. A special system of apprenticeship called Duale Ausbildung allows pupils on vocational courses to do in-service training in a company as well as at a state school.[3]
VI Recent PISA student assessments demonstrated serious weaknesses in German pupils' performance. In the test of 43 countries in the year 2000,[6] Germany ranked 21st in reading and 20th in both mathematics and the natural sciences, prompting calls for reform.[7] In 2006, German schoolchildren improved their position compared to previous years, being ranked (statistically) significantly above average (rank 13) in science skills and statistically not significantly above or below average in mathematical skills (rank 20) and reading skills (rank 18).[8][9]

VII. The PISA Examination also found big differences in achievement between students attending different types of German schools.[10] According to Jan-Martin-Wiadra:
      A. Conservatives prized the success of the Gymnasium, for them the finest school form in the world – indeed, it is by far the number one in the PISA league table.
          But what they prefer to forget is that this success came at the cost of a catastrophe in the Hauptschulen.[11]
     B. Some German teachers' representatives and a number of scientists disputed the PISA findings.[12] Claiming among other things that the questions have been ill-translated,
         that the samples drawn in some countries were not representative, that Germans (most of whom had never done a multiple choice tests in their lives before) were discriminated
         against by the multiple choice questions, that the PISA-questions had no curricular validity and that the PISA was "in fact an IQ-test", which according to them showed that dysgenic fertility
         was taking place in Germany.[13][14][15][16][17][18][19]
      C. A 2008 statistic from Nordrhein-Westfalen shows that 6.4 percent of all students did not earn even the Hauptschulabschluss, however not all of them were high school dropouts,
         as many of them were children with special needs, who received special school leaving certificates. Only 3.3 percent dropped out of school without earning any kind of diploma.[20]