Students will all be able to talk to you but people who went to school in East Germany before the '90s will most likely not have learned English. Due to the fact that most adults never used English outside of school and have never used it afterwards they, too, will be unable to speak English.

This is true outside of East Germany as well. Very few people in Germany speak English well enough to communicate.

sad to learn that (though i personally would be able to speak Russian to those seniors)