All teaching places filled in canton

It is fortunate that all teaching places in the canton have been able to be filled for the coming school year. However, there remains the problem of being able to recruit appropriately qualified remedial teachers.
 
Of course the school holidays have only just started but the start of the new academic year is only five weeks away. A recent survey showed that there were no teaching vacancies at all in the canton, a situation which has come about partly after very few teachers left their jobs in the municipalities of Steinhausen and Unterägeri.
 
There are problems, however, in finding sufficiently qualified remedial teachers. “We advertised for one in spring but we were not able to find one with the right qualification,” said a spokeswoman from a school in Steinhausen. It is here where the job is to be taken on by another teacher who is not qualified in this area.
 
This situation in Steinhausen is not the only case in the canton. Jürg Portmann, the president of the Conference of Senior Teachers at Municipal Schools in the Canton of Zug, explained how there had been increased demand for remedial staff since the policy of integrated schools had been implemented, through which pupils with behavioural or other difficulties were taught in the same classes as other children. As necessity was the mother of invention, he said how there was no alternative other than to employ staff without the appropriate qualification. However, applicants do have to be vetted and authorised by the canton.
 
Stephan Schleiss, the cantonal director of education, was very pleased to hear that all teaching places had been filled in the canton for the coming school year. He put this down partly to the fact that the canton is an attractive employer. As a result of the good pay offered here, the municipalities enjoyed the privilege of being able to recruit from among the best applicants. “And if you have good staff, you have good schools,” he said.
 
According to Schleiss, the fact that there was little or no shortage of teaching staff in the country as a whole was due in part to increased numbers of students at teacher training colleges over the past three years.
 
The photograph shows a classroom scene in Finstersee near Menzingen.