A few days before the start of the school year, thousands of teaching positions remain unfilled across the country, with the district of Faro among the most affected areas. The National Federation of Teachers (Fenprof) revealed that there are 2,650 positions on offer at schools, corresponding to more than 50,000 hours, of which 2,152 are full-time and annual. José Feliciano Costa, one of the general secretaries of Fenprof, warned that, if the school year were to start now, thousands of students would not have their teachers.
Lisbon is the area with the most positions to be filled, with 1,426, followed by Setúbal and Faro. However, the union leader stressed that this is not a localized problem, but a situation that affects the entire country. In particular, there are 378 full-time first-cycle positions to be filled, with emphasis on school clusters in the periphery of Lisbon, such as Queluz (Sintra), Amadora, Loures and Agualva (Sintra).
The 30% increase in school-offered positions demonstrates that educational establishments continue to have difficulties in finding teachers. Fenprof warned that the growing reliance on school hiring and overtime does not solve the problem, it only worsens the working conditions of existing professionals.
The union federation also called for attention to the renewal of the teaching profession, noting that in September more than 550 teachers will retire, without any response to these departures. José Feliciano Costa accused the Government of not having policies to favor the entry of young people into the profession.