Headscarf during teacher training

CAN A MUSLIM WOMAN WHO WEARS A HEADSCARF BE ALLOWED TO COMPLETE HER TEACHER TRANING?

Summarized: A headscarf-wearing Muslim woman is allowed to complete her teacher’s training. A ban on the wearing of a headscarf would only be permissible in a case of a concrete threat to the school peace. 

The Federal Administrative Court ruled in 2008 that headscarf-wearing teacher trainees may not be barred from the traineeship-program because of their fundamental right to free choice of profession according to Article 12, paragraph 1 of the German Constitution.¹ Any corresponding prohibition laws must therefore be interpreted in light of the Constitution as follows: that the wearing of the headscarf is principally allowed.² This means that access to teacher training shouldn’t be refused on the grounds of preventing an abstract, that is, theoretical endangerment of religious-ideological school peace alone.³ 

A headscarf ban is only permissible when there exists a concrete threat to the school peace which cannot be counteracted with other appropriate measures. 

^{1 Federal Administrative Court, case from 26.06.2008, 2 C 22.07, margin 12.}

^{2 See above, margin 23.}

^{3 See above, margin 28.}