Our View: The arbitrary appointment of teachers has to end

For several decades, anyone with a university degree was eligible to become a public school teacher, regardless of their abilities. All that was required was a bachelors degree from a university recognised by the education ministry to be eligible to become a teacher in a public secondary school.

Of course, he or she may have had to wait 10, 20 or 30 years to be hired and enter a classroom, but this was a formality once the person registered on the ministry’s waiting list. There was no teacher training for these candidates, who could be asked to enter a classroom and teach geography (in which they had a degree) after working for 20 years as a bookkeeper at a private business.

This was the criminally irresponsible way public school teachers were hired since the eighties. There was no interview, so hundreds of unsuitable graduates who knew nothing about teaching were entrusted with the education of our children. The parties, in order to eliminate nepotism from the hiring process opened the teaching profession to every indolent and unmotivated person with a degree that was prepared to wait their turn to be appointed.

Attempts to end this indiscriminate recruitment policy were always blocked by the parties, at the beck and call of the teaching unions. When eventually, the Anastasiades government tabled a bill ending the waiting list system, it was watered down by the parties and stipulated that 50 per cent of teachers would be hired through exams and the other 50 per cent would come from the waiting list for 10 years! In this way, the insane system was kept going for another 10 years.

Now, with just two years of the waiting list’s life remaining, there has been talk of extending it on the ludicrous grounds that it acted as a “safety net” for the system. And the reason for keeping it going, according to reports, is because not enough graduates pass the teacher hiring exams, especially for Greek, Maths and Sciences, so there would be a shortage. So, because young graduates failed the exams for a teaching job, the ministry will hire candidates from the waiting list without any exam! Those on the waiting list are considered better candidates than those who failed the exam because they never had to sit it. Is this a rational recruitment process that puts the interest of the children first?

There is an answer to the problem. The education ministry should follow the practice of the UK, where a teacher has to follow full-time teacher training which includes classroom teaching. Those that pass the end of course exam would get a job in a public school, if there were vacancies or go on a waiting list for a year. This puts an end to the waiting list system and, more importantly, trains candidates to teach, produce engaging lessons and control a classroom, something most teachers cannot do at present.

This is the way to make improve teaching in public schools, which would eventually raise educational standards.