Temp teachers say reforms will make them unemployed

By George Psyllides

TEMPORARY teachers staged a protest outside the education ministry on Friday over plans to change the hiring system, which they claim would lead a lot of non-permanent staff to unemployment.

Minister Costas Kadis said he was ready to listen to the educators and find consensual solutions.

What was important, Kadis said, was to “ensure that the education system was served by the fittest and most capable educators. We cannot have quality educators if their selection is not done with qualitative criteria.”

The current hiring system is a waiting list, which basically works on a first-come first-served basis.

The ministry wants to introduce a recruitment system based on written examinations, additional academic qualifications, and experience. Year of submission of first degree (current system), will also be among the criteria, but it will not be the main one.

“There are matters we must discuss with the education organisations, like the problem with non-permanent educators,” Kadis said, adding that concessions had been made in the proposals.

The overwhelming majority of contractual teachers was secure, he said.
The ministry’s initial intention was to secure all non-permanent staff in the three years before the new system was fully implemented in 2018.

But the state law office pointed out that this would not be legal.

“So, we are adopting this alternative approach, the permanent appointment of a large number of educators in the next three years, and universal implementation of the new system from 2018,” Kadis said.

The minister said considering the concessions made by the state, the protest was “unjustified, to say the least.”

“Our main concern is our children and how we ensure they are taught by the best,” Kadis said.

Protesters said the change would see many people lose the jobs, ignoring their service, which in some cases reached 14 years.

“How can an exam identify the right educator?” their petition said.

The teachers asked whether a study had been carried out to ensure that the plan would work.

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