Teacher shortage necessitates a four-day school week
Two large school umbrella organizations in Zaanstad are introducing a four-day school week when the teacher shortage becomes even more acute, such as during a flu wave. "Necessity breaks the law," says President of the Board Niko Persoon van Zaan Primair.
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In the Zaanstad region, Agora (25 primary schools) and Zaan Primair (28 primary schools) provide education for over 14 pupils. Both boards are suffering from the increasing teacher shortage. That is why the administrators sat down before the summer holidays to discuss their joint emergency measure: a four-day school week.
Director Rien Spies explains: “It is not the case that it will apply to all schools on our boards. We look at it per school.” The school boards mainly want to use the emergency measure in case of long-term shortages at a school, such as a flu wave that can easily last a month. Or if a teacher is ill for a long time. “If we introduce the four-day school week, it will be an eight-week block for a class,” says Spies.
Teaching time
That class will then receive five hours less teaching time for eight weeks and will not meet the statutory teaching time of 940 hours per year. “Necessity knows no law,” says Executive Board President Niko Persoon of Zaan Primair. At two schools of his school board, the four-day school week was already started last school year because of the teacher shortage. Persoon: "The Cito results of group 8 did not suffer as a result." That is not to say that he welcomes the measure. "Of course you don't want this. We did see that it gave parents clarity and peace of mind. We didn't hobble from emergency measure to emergency measure."
The four-day school week provides clarity and tranquility
Other emergency scenarios are already being applied at both school boards, such as dividing groups, internal supervisors and directors for the class, asking part-timers to work more hours, sending classes home. Spies: “With the four-day school week, we opt for the quality of education and consciously for our teachers. We do not want to increase the workload even further. If an IB or director is in front of the class, he or she will not get around to his other work. We have also often asked part-timers to work longer hours. Sending classes home or dividing them also does not ensure good quality of education, which is why we now opt for this measure. I have been working in primary education for 41 years and have never experienced this. Parents will be angry, but we can explain.”
Pathetic
AObchairman Liesbeth Verheggen says it is sad that it had to come to this. "It's what the union has been warning about for years." According to Verheggen, these school boards do provide clarity. "It remains sad that the cabinet has 2 billion available for scrapping the dividend tax, but not for a really good collective labor agreement for teachers."
