Shortage of replacements during flu wave
Last week, PON, the East Netherlands staff cluster, had to sell no dozens of times to schools that need a replacement.
image: pixabay
Of the 600 requests that PON received last week, 560 replacements have been arranged. “The 40 to which we said no do hurt,” says Mini Schouten, director of PON, in which 35 school boards work together. Cause? "The teacher shortage, we just have too few teachers." And then the peak of the flu wave is yet to come.
Leave of absence
Normally, schools also turn to PON for replacements other than illness replacement, for example for maternity leave. The staff cluster, with 120 affiliated primary schools between Winterswijk and Zwolle, has now decided to give priority to disease replacement. Because pregnancy replacement can be planned, schools are asked to arrange this themselves and to contact PON only in case of acute emergency. Schouten: "Now we have agreed that illness comes first."
I recommend sending home classes that have not been replaced
The schools that don't have a replacement now can do several things: “I recommend sending the class home. In this way the problem is made visible and you show what is going on. ” In other solutions, insofar as you can talk about solutions, Schouten mainly sees disadvantages. “When there is a principal in front of the class, development in the school comes to a standstill. If an internal counselor is in front of the class, appropriate education is at stake. And if you divide the class, it will not benefit any class and it will affect all students. If you send a class home, the rest will continue. ”
