Austria - AHS-Rahlgasse

AHS Rahlgasse is a secondary school (www.ahs-rahlgasse.at), situated in the city centre of Vienna.
Founded in 1892 it was the first secondary school for girls in Vienna, since 1978/79 the school is
open for girls and boys. The specific focus of our school is: general education with a focus on gender
equality & diversity, environmental and social issues. The age range of our students is from 10 - 18
years. The total number of students (boys and girls) is about 720 and we are 80 teachers. As a
general educational school, we feel obliged to follow a holistic educational approach that combines
and develops cognitive, social and musical skills. Cultural diversity is seen as a value-adding
resource at our school, which we try to establish and build upon. In addition to our own cultural
diversity, we actively encourage an exchange with schools abroad. Development of social skills
Reflection on interpersonal communication as well as the respect for the institutions of democracy
within and outside of our school is an implicit focus of our educational programs. Every student
should be able to understand and question all forms of authority and decision-making as well as their
ways of interaction and – if necessary – have the possibility to develop suggestions of change. In
Vienna, our school is well known for its open-mindedness and its cooperation with partners,
especially universities, science centres but also NGOs. It was nominated twice for the national
Erasmus + award in Austria. The school is member of the UNESCO ASP Network. Furthermore, our
school is EMAS certified. We have gained quite some experience in project work on local and
international level, we can for example look back on several successful Erasmus + and former
Comenius projects. We intend to expand our international contacts and to benefit strategically in
terms of quality development alongside our school focus areas Gender - Environment - Social
awareness. We want to improve the competence of the teachers involved in terms of content,
creativity, teaching methods (Ict, non-formal learning etc.) and planning and to ensure that the
development of international contacts and the interconnection of the aforementioned three school
focus areas can be more successful at levels of organization, content and didactics. The team
included in the application is composed of the following two persons: Rainer Redl - Team
Coordinator – French and Mathematics Teacher, Member of the school focus team, leader of several
international projects in the past, Peer Mediation, ICT Barbara Helm – History and Geography
Teacher, Member of the school focus team, leader of several international projects in the past, in
charge of UNESCO projects at our school.