For employees of the Berlin Senate Department for Education, Youth and Family Affairs (SenBJF), education statistics are part of their everyday work. For those without expertise in the field, however, the numbers can be complicated to grasp. In order to raise the communication with citizens and the press to a new level and to facilitate transparency in the political discourse, an intuitive and easily understandable preparation of the projected student numbers by districts and in comparison was needed. Other senate administrations should also benefit from this.

The solution transforms the relevant data of the SenBJF and prepares them intuitively and comprehensibly as a Public Solution Model Calculation for Pupils. The development of the number of students in the public mainstream education schools in Berlin is visualised with historical data and as a forecast. For the latter, the model calculation represents a “status quo forecast”. These calculations are carried out by the SenBJF itself. Finally, the processed data are used to address capacity needs and teacher planning in the medium term. The model calculation allows filtering by school level, grade and district.

The model calculations can also be traced historically. Calculations from previous years can be compared with the actual number of students in order to compare the results with the changing model projections and thus derive statements about their quality. A table shows the deviations precisely, making it easy to make and justify comparisons.

Viewers of the Public Solution can access the comprehensible model calculations online and also filter them by school level, year and district. With the help of the map view of Berlin, the development of pupil numbers per district can be recorded in a heat map, for example. But it is not only communication with citizens or the press that is made easier. Other senate administrations can also use the publicly accessible solution for their planning.

The Public Solution makes an aspect/section of education statistics and forecasts easily accessible to the public. Due to the intuitive and easy-to-understand presentation, which does not require specialist knowledge or high data competence, citizens and the press can easily understand the model calculation. This increases political transparency. Furthermore, the solution links to further information on the methodology itself. This gives visitors the opportunity to delve deeper into the subject matter.

Since the Public Solution went live, the SenBJF has been able to confidently refer questioners to the website. There, extensive interactive data evaluations are easily accessible, where previously important personnel resources were tied up by special evaluations.