Minister seeks to tackle private lessons nightmare

EDUCATION Minister Pefkios Georgiades is meeting with state teachers’ union OELMEK today to discuss the problem of private lessons after school.

The minister is believed to be preparing a new campaign to tackle the long-standing phenomenon of children requiring a plethora of private lessons after school. A large majority of school children spend their afternoons taking extra lessons with teachers who work in the public sector. Pupils who wish to continue with higher education often take extra lessons to better their chances of joining a British or Greek university. This not only takes up more of the children’s time but also adds to the parents’ financial obligations. According to the law, government teachers are not permitted to take on second jobs, and provide extra lessons after school.

Observers believe the problem is a broad one that needs tackling on many levels of the education system.

OELMEK General Manager Iacovos Iacovou told the Cyprus Mail that he had not heard anything yet from official circles but that he expected the minister to present a series of measures in their meeting today to deal with the issue.

“Unofficially, we have heard that the minister has in his hands a list of government teachers who are giving private lessons, and that he is considering measures on that,” said Iacovou.

The list is reportedly also in the hands of the police, but according to reports, Georgiades will try getting consensus with the unions on how to deal with the matter before considering legal action.

Iacovou argued that prosecution was not the answer. A full reform of the education system needed to be examined. “We need to have reform of many aspects of the education system, and take a look at the education programmes, the requirements of university entry examinations, and a possible reduction of the syllabus.”

He said OELMEK would wait and see what the minister puts before them in today’s meeting before commenting further.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.