Teacher caretaker who shared job with his wife retires after 36 years

Job-sharing is not unusual these days but it was back in 1990 when Lucerne-born teacher Klaus Birrer sought to share his job of teaching and caretaking at a school in Rotkreuz with his wife, Adeline, as he wanted to spend more time with his four children. Initially the education authorities we sceptical, but it the end they agreed, and it all worked out well.

Birrer actually started teaching in1983 but at the end of this last term he retired after 36 years in the classroom, looking after the building and grounds, too. As to his wife, she is carrying on for the moment.

The couple actually complemented each other very well, Klaus teaching English, handicraft, music and art, as his wife taught mathematics, German, Man and his Environment and sport. How did they cope working in the same place and living in the same house? Surprisingly well, even if they did find themselves taking about school matters in the free time, too.

Prior to their sharing the teaching job, Mrs Burrer was actually the caretaker at the school, a job which her husband subsequently took over, and which enabled both of them to live in the caretaker’s flat which came with the job. When he needed to get away from school matters, he took himself off to the woods or the lake, both actually enjoy walking and cycling. The whole situation became even further family-oriented when their four children were taught there by their parents, who were addressed by them in informal style, contrary to the norm. Not that this turned out to be a problem.

Birrer was not just a teacher in the classroom, but outside it, too. He once wrote a play involving all members of the school and converted a bus to a classroom and dormitory when it came to going on class trips, and was instrumental in organising the first ever school skiing trip in Risch. This itself was the subject of some controversy, the authorities initially saying it was not their job to finance parents’ trips for their children.

In his role as caretaker he also brightened up the schoolgrounds, too, by setting up a fountain, for example, and bringing in the cabin of an old cable-car as a group room, not to mention the installation of a bread baking oven he and the pupils made (in the background in the photograph). This was actually used on the last school day, producing particularly tasty loaves.

As mentioned, Ms Birrer is to stay on at the school for a further two years, while Mr Birrer goes off to some part of the world he has not yet been to, perhaps Cuba, the Baltic States or Albania. Then he wants spend more time with his grandchildren, too.

There is no doubt his pupils will miss him. At least it cannot be said he missed his calling; he clearly lived it, didn’t he?