Military defeat left the western two thirds of Germany divided into four separately administered military occupation zones. Schulz's home region was now administered as part of the Soviet occupation zone, and it was to the Soviet zone that he returned, following his release at the end of the war. During 1945/46 he took casual work, and was also employed for a time as a teacher under the "Neulehrer" scheme, introduced in occupied Germany to try and mitigate the chronic shortage of surviving school teachers. Between 1946 and 1949 he studied Pedagogy at the Leipzig University. While he was a student, Schulz joined The Party. Between 1950 and 1957 he taught at the middle school in (Leipzig).