01-10-2023
The lack of teachers in Portugal is a problem that has worsened in recent years, a discussion that has already been taken to the streets, awaiting a response from the Ministry of Education, but without resolution. The newspaper Nova Verdade contacted the council's school groups, Abrigada, Alenquer, Carregado and Merceana, during the first two weeks of school, to find out to how this problem is affecting the quality of teaching and the education of students.
In the current school year, with the opening taking place between 12 and 15 September, around 27 teachers were missing from the four groups. Agrupamento de Escolas Damião Goes (Alenquer) stood out with 10 missing teachers who had full timetables, in other words, who would be teaching several classes.
Two weeks after the start of classes, the newspaper Nova Verdade contacted the centres again to find out if the cases had been resolved. As far as we can tell, there has been a general decrease in the number of missing teachers, with the exception of Alenquer, which has a total of eight missing teachers. However, in the case of Agrupamento de Escolas de Abrigada, the only unfilled vacancy is for a teacher who will be teaching a Spanish class, which makes the proposal more difficult to accept as it doesn't correspond to a full timetable.
In Merceana, on the other hand, only one Catholic Moral and Religious Education teacher was needed for a full timetable. Even so, the director of the Visconde de Chanceleiros School Group (Merceana), Ana Coelho, admitted that the case "has been difficult to resolve", being to resolve", as it is one of one of the cases that has complicated the filling vacancies.
What's failing?
"This has to do with the educational policy that has been lacking in teacher training over the last ten years. We stopped training teachers more than 15 years ago, forgetting those who were in the system and who were retiring in the meantime. Even with the drop in the birth rate, we're still going to need teachers, and the Minister of Education himself has already recognised that by 2030, more than 30,000 teachers will be needed, because the same number will be leaving the system," explained Luís Paulo Martins, headmaster of Agrupamento de Escolas of Abrigada.
Listening to the headteachers, who represent the schools, we realised that they all share the same opinion: there is a problem due to the lack of attractiveness of the profession. In addition to the Ministry of Education's lack of investment in training, working conditions are very precarious. "On 1 September, I had seven vacancies [to fill], of which four could have been resolved, but these people declined their contracts. They will have their reasons, but we reckon they may have something to do with financial issues, such as distance and accommodation," explained Alberto Seco, director of the Carregado School Group. Ana Coelho, director of the Visconde de Chanceleiros School Group, added that all the factors mentioned have progressively devalued the image of the teacher.
"The difficulty of hiring teaching staff is essentially due to the fact that fewer and fewer young people want to be teachers, and so we teachers are an increasingly ageing, sicker class. Teachers are retiring and this is getting worse," she explained.
However, Maria Clara, director of the Damião de Goes School Group, argued that it's not the school groups that are responsible for the problem, saying that "it depends on the Ministry of Education's system, because the school group has done everything in its power, invitations to tender, hiring and dividing up timetables".