Compulsory education in Brussels: the impact of FWB and Flemish Community budget cuts

Why this dossier directly concerns Brussels residents

In Brussels, your child's school is managed by the Wallonia-Brussels Federation (if it is francophone) or by the Flemish Community (if it is Dutch-speaking). The Brussels-Capital Region — to which your family pays regional taxes — has virtually no power over compulsory education. This is the first anomaly of the "institutional lasagna" for Brussels parents: the Brussels government cannot prevent cuts decided in central Brussels at the FWB Parliament, nor those decided at the Flemish Parliament.

How many children in each network? According to perspective.brussels (Panorama of school in Brussels, 2023-2024), 92% of Brussels children aged 3 to 17 attend a school organised or subsidised by one of the Communities (FWB or Flemish Community); the remaining 8% attend private, European or international schools, or are home-schooled. Dutch-language education in Brussels counts around 53,600 students in 2024-2025 — about one child in five enrolled in the Community networks (VGC / GO! Scholengroep Brussel). The vast majority of the others attend the FWB network.

How many households combine both networks? According to IBSA (data as of 1 January 2021, published in August 2025), among 128,903 Brussels households with at least one child aged 3-17:

• 96% (124,013 households) enrol their children in a single system;
• 2.5% (2,897 households) combine FWB and Flemish Community;
• 1% (1,286) FWB + another system (private, European, international);
• 0.5% (660) Flemish + another system.

In 2026, these two levels of power — over which the Brussels Region has no leverage — are simultaneously imposing cuts that affect:

• Brussels teachers and school heads (secondary, primary, special needs);
• francophone students (end of free schooling in P1-P3, tuition increase);
• Dutch-speaking newcomer students (reduction in OKAN coach funding, see dedicated section below);
• higher education students (+€359 in tuition per year, FWB side).

FWB section (francophone education)

The Glatigny budget plan: €86.7M in compulsory education (2026)

The Wallonia-Brussels Federation government, led by Education Minister Valérie Glatigny (MR), announced in October 2025 a savings plan of €500 million for the 2026-2029 period, including €255 million in 2026. Compulsory education bears the heaviest burden with €86.7 million in cuts the first year.

The concrete measures for the 2026-2027 school year:

• Teachers' working time: upper secondary teachers move from 20 to 22 hours of classroom teaching per week, aligning their workload with lower secondary. For a Brussels school, this reform mechanically reduces the number of temporary positions (fewer remaining hours to distribute).
• Sick leave: after exhausting sick days, the maintained rate drops from 80-70% to 60% — a loss of purchasing power for already-precarious teachers.
• Operating funds: school budgets are not indexed in 2026 — in practice, a real decrease.
• Free primary schooling: abolition of free schooling for grades P1 to P3, redirected to school budgets with "modest savings".
• Teacher status: the permanent appointment is replaced by a new "CDI-E" contract (school-model permanent contract) from 2027. New teachers will no longer benefit from the historic job security.
• Higher education: catch-up of tuition indexation since 2011 — the standard rate rises from €835 to €1,194 per year from the start of the 2026-2027 academic year, a +43% increase. For Brussels, this directly affects families of students at ULB, VUB (via its FWB component), USL-B and francophone University Colleges.

The FWB government claims to have "protected" current teachers' salaries, indexation for serving teachers, class sizes and the reform of initial teacher training. It also announces a 5% increase in the salary of new master-degree qualified teachers from 2027.

Source: La DH (10 Oct. 2025); Bruxelles Today (2026).

Strike and demonstration of 9 April 2026: 10,000-15,000 people in the streets of Brussels

On 9 April 2026, between 10,000 and 15,000 people (10,000 according to police, 15,000 according to unions) marched through Brussels against the FWB government's austerity plan. It was the second demonstration in four months — on 15 December 2025, 5,000 to 7,000 people had already marched for the same reasons. The doubling of mobilisation in four months illustrates the amplifying anger in the education, culture, youth and childcare sectors.

Route: departure of the main procession at 10 am from Brussels Midi station, along the small ring road with stops at the MR party headquarters (heavy police presence), the Engagés offices and the FWB government seat at place Surlet de Chokier. The Mars Attacks collective (protesters wearing Martian masks) joined the main movement from the Pension Tower.

Among the banners: "Education is not an expense, it is the first line of defence" and "And to think I voted Engagés...".

At the Institut Maris Stella (Laeken) — a Brussels secondary school cited by RTBF via its head teacher Imane Kenfaoui — the strike rate reaches 35% of staff on 9 April, compared to 24% during the December 2025 strike. "We are experiencing a malaise that is settling into the walls of the school," she describes, reproaching the FWB government for shifting from a logic of "co-constructed reforms" to a "top-down" logic: "politics decides, we apply, and we discover the difficulties on the ground."

CGSP Enseignement denounces:

• the increase in workload;
• underinvestment in Brussels school infrastructure (several schools need urgent renovation);
• measures penalising sick teachers;
• the planned abolition of more than 100 support and accompaniment advisor positions.

Sources: RTBF (9 April 2026); Bruxelles Today; L'Avenir.

"Mars Attacks" collective: protest spreads through the schools

In parallel with the union strikes, a spontaneous collective of school heads and teachers — "Mars Attacks" — formed in March 2026. Starting with 13 schools, it now brings together around 45 institutions across Wallonia and Brussels. This collective denounces a savings logic that, according to them, durably destabilises the teaching profession and the quality of education.

An intersectoral action is announced for 12 May 2026 (health, education, non-profit, linked to federal pensions).

Source: RTBF, "Mars Attacks: schools' response".

Flemish Community section (Dutch-language education)

The Demir budget plan: €63.5M on secondary education (revised downward)

On 15 March 2026, the Flemish Education Minister Zuhal Demir (N-VA) announced a downward revision of the planned cuts in Flemish secondary education: the amount is reduced from €150M to €63.5M (−57.7%), following in particular lower-than-expected enrollment in the seventh year and reduced spending on specialised teachers. The maintained measures include:

• A 10% reduction in supplementary funding for small classes;
• A 2.5% cut to school community operating budgets;
• A reduction in funding allocated to OKAN transition coaches (Onthaalklas Anderstalige Nieuwkomers), without an overall percentage officially communicated by the Demir cabinet.

Source: businessam.be — Secondary education cuts turn out to be much smaller.

Concrete impact on Brussels OKAN schools

On 20 March 2026, five days after Demir's announcement, the Flemish Community Commission (VGC) held a debate on the concrete impact of the cuts on Dutch-language education in Brussels. The point of friction: the reduction in resources allocated to OKAN coaches, who support newcomer students in their transition to mainstream education. BRUZZ documents the detail of the reductions per Brussels school — figures published after the Demir revision but not challenged by it:

Brussels schools directly impacted:

In 2024-2025, 394 newcomer students were enrolled in OKAN at secondary level in Brussels. The reduction in coaches means that a significant number of these young people — often from families recently arrived in Brussels, initially non-Dutch-speaking — lose the support that facilitates their integration into the mainstream system.

Political reactions:

• Emile Luhahi (Groen) denounces "a bloodbath" and considers that the measure threatens the entire OKAN system. He argues that "copy-paste policy from Flanders does not work in Brussels", given the region's multilingual and diverse reality.
• Dirk De Smedt (Anders.) responds that the cuts specifically target follow-up coaches, not OKAN education itself, and that schools receive additional resources for Dutch language reinforcement.

Source: BRUZZ, 20 March 2026.

Other Flemish 2026 measures affecting Brussels residents

• Higher education: cuts of more than €80 million, including €46 million on the operating budgets of universities and colleges. The VUB (Vrije Universiteit Brussel) published a statement in March 2026 denouncing the scale of the cuts. Students will see their tuition fees increase by €150 per year from the 2026-2027 academic year.
• Study grants: −€33.8M on student grants — direct impact on Brussels Dutch-speaking students from modest income backgrounds.
• Religion and ethics courses: savings of €33M in 2026, then €100M/year from 2027, via a reform decided by the Flemish government on 30 January 2026.
• GO! out-of-school care: from 1 September 2026, the GO! network (Flemish public education) no longer funds staff for before- and after-school care. A burden that will fall on municipalities, parents, or disappear.

Dutch-language primary registrations 2026: 42% on waiting list (24 April)

The LOP Brussel Basisonderwijs platform published on 24 April 2026 the results of the 2026 registrations for Dutch-language primary education (kindergarten and primary) in Brussels.

Key figures:

• 2,180 priority children had already been enrolled in January (siblings + children of staff)
• 5,414 applications were submitted via the standard procedure (after January)
• Of those 5,414: nearly 60% got a spot at a chosen school; 42% (~2,274 children) are on a waiting list

What LOP says: "A refusal means demand exceeds supply in that school or neighbourhood." Parents on a waiting list must wait for a drop-out or look for another school.

In perspective: Dutch-language primary education in Brussels hosts around 53,600 pupils in 2024-2025 (all levels, VGC / GO! Scholengroep Brussel) — about 1 pupil in 5 enrolled in the Community networks. The strain on NL primary capacity resonates with the reduction in OKAN coaches (newcomers) documented elsewhere in this dossier and with the wider "education lasagna" debate.

Source: LOP Brussel Basisonderwijs, via BRUZZ (24 April 2026).

The double lasagna: who decides what for your child's school?

This fragmentation explains why no Brussels regional decision can cancel or mitigate cuts decided in central Brussels at the FWB Parliament (rue de la Loi) or at the Flemish Parliament (rue du Gouvernement provisoire). A Brussels parent wanting to defend their child's school must address the right level of power — information that precarious families, or non-francophone/non-Dutch-speaking families, have the most difficulty obtaining.

Regional commitment (RPD 2026): the Masterplan Tweetaligheid

The Brussels Regional Policy Declaration of 12 February 2026 provides for a Masterplan Tweetaligheid (bilingualism), but it concerns only:

• the training of regional civil servants;
• municipal services (functional bilingualism);
• Brussels hospitals.

It does not cover compulsory education, which remains an exclusive community competence. Brussels residents therefore remain dependent on the budget choices of the FWB and the Flemish Community for their children's schools.

What to monitor

1. 12 May 2026: announced national intersectoral action (education, health, non-profit, federal pensions).
2. Implementation of CDI-E (2027): the first cohorts of new FWB teachers hired under precarious status.
3. OKAN cohort 2026-2027: tracking the number of supported vs unsupported newcomer students in Brussels.
4. Class closures and reassignments in Brussels schools at the start of the 2026-2027 school year, linked to teachers' new teaching load.
5. Municipal grants: how do Brussels municipalities absorb the withdrawal of GO! funding for out-of-school care?

Sources and methodology

The facts presented in this dossier come from verified press sources (RTBF, BRUZZ, La DH, L'Avenir, Bruxelles Today) and institutional statements (VGC, CGSP Enseignement). FWB amounts come from the Glatigny government's budget plan announced in October 2025. OKAN figures come from the VGC debate of 20 March 2026.

BGM does not pass judgement on the appropriateness of the cuts decided by the FWB or the Flemish Community — it documents their concrete effects on Brussels residents, in line with its mission as a transparent mirror of governance in Brussels.