Kloster Berge school

[5] Instruction appears to have been restricted to the medieval trivium and quadrivium,[5] and took place in the cloister of the parsonage until one schoolmaster hanged himself there and it was moved to a specially built round tower.

[13] At that time the school had 40–50 new pupils a year and a total student body of over 150, and noble families from all over the Holy Roman Empire and beyond sent their sons to be educated there.

[15] The monastery had become a centre of Pietism; the school was closely associated with August Hermann Francke's Franckesche Stiftungen in Halle,[16] and in 1735 an institute for the training of rural schoolteachers was founded.

[17][18][19] In 1750, after being denied official permission, Steinmetz with the assistance of some benefactors established a separate free school for 100 poor children of Magdeburg, in a house which he bought for the purpose.

[21] The school declined starting in 1762 when Steinmetz' chosen successor as abbot proved unsatisfactory; he was authoritarian, sought to relate all instruction explicitly to the New Testament and reduced expenditure excessively, including cutting back on free places at the school, and teachers and pupils left.