School directors are regularly at a loss because the teacher shortages sometimes make it impossible to complete the timetables. So creative solutions are constantly being sought to ensure that classes do not have to be sent home. For example, by putting (unauthorized) students and teaching assistants in front of the class.
It’s not all ideal. Sometimes it is also unintentionally at the expense of the quality of education. But with a shortage of 9,100 full-time elementary school teachers and more than 1,700 full-time high school jobs, the teacher shortage is an increasingly acute problem. These kinds of emergency measures are sometimes the only solution.
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That is why the cabinet is now coming up with an action plan to combat this. For example, there will be more money for training lateral entrants and teaching assistants. There is also a closer look at how the knowledge and skills that lateral entrants often already have can be used.
In addition, better information will be provided to get more students on teacher training courses. And it is looking at how teachers who now work part-time can be stimulated to work more. For example with a bonus. School boards are being asked whether they can offer more flexible working hours, so that teachers can, for example, bring their own children to school.
A new education agreement had already been concluded with the unions in which primary school teachers will earn the same as secondary school teachers. The government hopes that this will make the teaching profession more attractive.
without taboos
But because these plans will certainly not solve the teacher shortages in the short term, the cabinet also wants to look at other options without taboos. The education ministers want to start a discussion via social media and with conversations in the country.
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The unorthodox measures include, for example, no longer having a permanent teacher for the class or changing the daily and weekly schedules of primary schools.
Disrupt future
Minister Dennis Wiersma of Primary and Secondary Education says this is necessary because the teacher shortage is disrupting the future of students: “We do not have the luxury to create taboos, we also need to talk about sensitive topics. The classic picture of a permanent teacher for the classroom is no longer feasible in many places. More and more groups have to stay at home for a day or receive lessons from a teaching assistant.”
According to Minister Dijkgraaf, teacher shortages are the Achilles heel of education. There are shortages not only in primary and secondary schools. But they can also be felt at the MBO in the subjects of care and technology: “The teacher training courses also play an important role in training more new teachers, and as far as I am concerned also in the guidance of starters and in professionalization in education.”
No unauthorized persons
The AOb union is happy that there is ‘final political will’ to do something about the teacher shortage. But daily director Thijs Roovers also reacts with some restraint to the taboo-breaking thinking of the ministers. “We have serious objections to the unauthorized teaching of, for example, teaching assistants. The quality of education will decrease enormously as a result. We have to be careful with our students. And in our view, qualified teachers are a precondition for good education.”
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