The forthcoming academic year that begins in September will find the Greek education system facing perhaps one its toughest years due to the 25,000 empty posts in schools and universities.
So far, the Ministry of Education has appointed 1,174 available employees at universities across Greece and has reinstated a further 300 technical educators, whose posts had been abolished by the previous government.
The Ministry of Education has announced that its initial plan of recruiting and appointing 2,000 permanent educators in schools and universities remains, however the Teacher Federation of Greece (DOE) considers this highly unlikely.
According to DOE Vice President Komninos Mantas, over 10,000 teachers in primary education have retired in the past five years, but only 275 have been recruited. The board member of the secondary education federation (OLME) Nikos Papachristou also noted that high schools will be about 10,000 educators short in the upcoming year.
Traditionally the shortages were addressed by EU funding and recruiting replacement educators, however it seem unlikely that the shortages will be covered adequately this year.
