School, too many responsibilities and negligible compensation: the difficult start of the commissions for the Pnrr competitions

AAA looking for teachers and school managers for the commissions of the Pnrr competitions. A month and a half after the written test, the regional school offices are still grappling with the puzzle of the judging commissions for the ordinary selections announced in December 2023.

I continued package

Only a part of the commissions have been appointed and, even after the appointment, there are continuous flat-rates.

Insignificant compensation and excessive responsibilities

Insignificant salaries, considerable responsibilities to be assumed and the risk of appeals that could prolong the commitment for several months, perhaps years, induce senior teachers who meet the requirements and school managers to stay away from the sirens pressing to step forward.

Retired principals

To the point that in several cases retired principals have been recruited. In the meantime, the weeks pass and the probability that all the chairs made available will be filled with the relevant competition winners by the start of next year becomes increasingly remote.

Monitoring

According to monitoring by Tuttoscuola, as of April 30th the regional school offices, which manage the various procedures, have yet to complete the appointment of one judging commission in three for the middle and high school competitions and one in ten for the childhood and primary school. In total, as of yesterday, 4 out of 47 commissions were missing for the elementary and nursery school competitions and 141 out of 420 for middle and high school.

The defection of commissioners, presidents and secretaries

In the meantime, there are 167 defections of commissioners, presidents and secretaries already appointed who have had second thoughts. In Piedmont, the commission for aspiring teachers of Italian, History and Geography at middle school is missing and in Sicily the commissions for the selections of Physical Education, also at middle school, and Natural Sciences have not yet been appointed (A050 ) to the superior. While in Campania the commission for Art and image for the media is still awaited: the former Artistic Education.

The lack of candidates

Part of the 44,000+ places up for grabs on Viale Trastevere will not be assigned due to a lack of candidates. Certainly 9,904 support chairs, out of the 15,588 made available because in four regions (Lombardy, Piedmont, Veneto and Tuscany) and especially in the first cycle the applications for participation are lower than the places up for grabs. Then there is the natural screening determined by the written and oral tests. The ministry has already taken into account that at the end of the procedure a part of the over 44 thousand available places will not be assigned, at least 12 thousand, and foresees a further competition to be announced between September/October 2024 for 24,694 places. But without commissions the oral tests cannot begin and in some cases will last beyond September 1st, frustrating the intention of naming the winners of the competition by next September.

The long line of appeals

Almost all tenure competitions are followed by a long line of appeals, both individual and collective. Certainly, this procedure will be subject to appeal because, as per the announcement, there will be no suitable non-winners of the competition. In other words, only those who place within the available places will be able to access the professorship – after having acquired the qualification and having passed the probationary year, according to the new methods established by the Draghi decrees on the Pnrr. All the others, even if they have passed the tests, will have to repeat the competition. And the lawyers will probably find other reasons to support the reasons of the excluded. The aftermath of appeals is one of the reasons that makes many teachers and school managers desist from presenting their candidacy. But there are also economic reasons: for months of work, without exemption from teaching and in the middle of summer, a gross salary of up to around one thousand euros is expected. Or slightly surpass them. One more reason to decline the invitation.