"which no one studies in school"
In Denmark we can select German classes in both elementary and high school.
In Denmark we can select German classes in both elementary and high school.
Of course, when you think about this in the context of moving to Berlin after the rising startup scene, we're only interested in those who actually attend university, who care about their future, who study hard and so on. Such people probably start planning their future at younger age, aim for and dream about careers in the field even before other kids learn to understand what an actual career is. People with true ambitions are rare in general population, but not in the startup scene, I think this is something to be remembered.
If you work at an elementary school, aren't you supposed (or even obligated) to teach them how important it is and that it does matter? Language is one of those things that are so easy to learn when you're a kid, so it shouldn't go to waste. Just don't give in to this miserable "they don't care" thing, because it's not them, it's you.
I think the natural curiosity and will to learn(for example by motivating the kids to study, making school and studying as fun as possible etc.) is far more important than planning your futre as a minor, let alone trying to aim for a career as a minor. I'm talking about whole classes of students from various backgrounds and performances, not just the top 5 % performers of which most will attend universities and achieve great things. I'd guess many HN'ers fell to the better half of the average performance at school, and as such might easily miss the other half who did not do so well.
I'm also from Finland and I used to study German at school, as did many others in my school. However it is hard language, and in Finland they mostly teach you writing/reading/grammar.
At that age I couldn't care less but now that I'm thinking of doing a PhD in Germany (from what I've heard a very affordable country with many great life science labs) I'm very glad that I remember at least basics even that I haven't actually spoken German for six years.
I think that learning two major foreign languages should be mandatory. Almost everybody can learn one language quite well after +/- 10 years during childhood and to learn at least basics from the second one should not be that much of a problem too.
I'm not discouraging, but once you're considering a particular position, please try and talk to previous PhD students of your prospective supervisor. Germany has hardly any fully-funded PhD positions. Instead you typically get employed as staff and have to combine that with your PhD work. The problem is, often professors take on lots of PhD students to get more funding and end up having hardly any time. I've heard stories of a professor having 8 or so PhD students that still wait on him to read their thesis and give the go-ahead for their viva (PhD defense). I'm not saying this is the case everywhere, but it's something to be aware of. So try and find out beforehand.
Sadly, the situation as you decribed is almost the same with PhD students in the lab where I currently work on my diploma thesis and in some around in the institute. Having seen what I've seen (troubles with disertations and giving the PhD defense go-ahead) that's definitely something I want to avoid.