About 2,000 teachers absent in schools of Moldova

Chisinau, 21 July /MOLDPRES/ - The schools of Moldova face a deficit of teachers. Presently, about 2,000 teachers are absent in the national education system. Education and Research Minister Dan Perciun unveiled figures to this effect today. The minister said the authorities were looking for solutions, in order to motivate young people to go and work in schools.    
„Unfortunately, only one fourth out of all graduates goes to teach in schools after the education. We lose a half of them at the phase of distribution. So, about 500 out of 1,000 graduates accept a position in school, in principle, and less than 250 are left till the beginning of the school year. Practically, only 25 per cent of those who graduate go to school. This deficit of teachers increases year after year,’’ Dan Perciun said.   
In these circumstances, one of the priorities of the Education and Research Ministry (MEC) will be the doubling of the number of young people who choose to go to school to teach, ‘’ as otherwise, without a teacher, we cannot speak about a quality education,’’ the minister noted.      
‘’We will present proposals after the next week consultations. We talk about scholarships and additional facilities for the best students in pedagogy. At the same time, we talk about the attraction of lyceum graduates to choose pedagogy, in principle, through certain instruments of stimulation and on the whole, about a bigger and better targeted package of benefits, which is to stimulate young people to choose and go to pedagogy and who, after the graduation, choose to go and work in schools,’’ Dan Perciun stressed.     
Under recent provisions of the Education Code, decision-makers proposed to increase the sum of allowances provided to young specialists employed in the education system from 120,000 lei to 200,000 lei (10,000 euros) for the graduates of higher education institutions and from 96,000 lei to 160,000 lei for the graduates of the post-secondary vocational education institutions.   
More than 1,200 schools work in Moldova, where about 300,000 pupils study. Most institutions are high schools.