Hundreds of teachers protest in front of government

Chisinau, 17 January /MOLDPRES/- Hundreds of teachers from around the country today protested in front of the government, being dissatisfied with low wages of employees in education.

Deputy Education Minister Elena Cernei said she backed demarches to increase salaries of teachers, but not protests that had been organized, as they led to disturbance of the educational system.

“The Education Ministry had more meetings with representatives of the government to identify viable solutions to the claims submitted by trade unions in education and science. Today we are going to hold meetings, to analyze and find possibilities to solve requirements to a dialogue table and in no way to protests. We are aware that the lack of a good salary, especially for young specialists indirectly influences the quality and relevance of education. We are currently developing a new methodology for teacher salary and namely according to the professional results got by each of them”, Cernei said.

At the same time, according to a communiqué by the Education Ministry, the authorities took a string of actions to improve the situation in the matter. Thus, starting from 1 September 2016, the teacher wage increased by 8.6 per cent, and from 1 January 2017, the young specialists benefit from a 75-per cent-reduction in teaching assignments for a salary got during the first three years of activity. Also, one off allowances will be increased for this category of teachers in 2017.

In early January 2017, the General Council of Trade Union Federation of Education and Science decided to organize on 17-20 January protests in front of government and parliament, because of low salaries of teachers, being placed below the minimum subsistence level.

(Reporter P. Beregoi, editor M. Jantovan)