All-day schools face teacher shortages of about 10 per cent

Staffing shortages of about 10 per cent persist in all-day schools in primary and secondary education, MPs heard at the House education committee on Wednesday. Committee chairman and Diko MP Chrysanthos Savvides said the scheme began in 1999 with nine school units and now covers 383, with participation having risen from 7,000 pupils to 18,000. “Something right is being done” by the education ministry, he said, but urged that the staffing gap “should be eliminated by next year”. A new list of appointees has been created for the schools in the hope of easing the problem. He said technical and vocational schools had shown interest but had no units available. Akel MP Christos Christofides said the ministry should now make sure all-day schools open on the first day of term and that teachers know their postings by the end of summer. “It is not possible for parents who planned to take their children to all-day schools to not know what to do with them for about a month,” he said. Late hiring was pulling teachers from full-time schools and from private schools, which had reported closing classes when staff left mid-year. Disy MP Prodromos Alampritis said steps had been taken “in the right direction”, with the optional schools now opening a week earlier. Ninety teacher positions in optional all-day schools had still not been requested. He said teachers should be told by June where they will work in September, and proposed converting most contracts to 29 hours “so that they are more attractive to teachers”. Elam MP Sotiris Ioannou, whose party registered the issue, said parents were entitled to “a more substantial and supportive approach” from the state. He said a child’s right to withdraw from the programme, for tutoring or sport, should be respected, and that its optional nature should not stop the search for solutions so that children do not leave.