N-VA Brussels on action against teacher shortage: “Move forward, contribute to solutions yourself”

In concrete terms, this concerns 22 primary schools in Anderlecht, Brussels City and Molenbeek, three municipalities with Dutch-speaking education aldermen from Vooruit. Gilles Verstraeten, in addition to being a Member of Parliament in Brussels, also a municipal councilor in Anderlecht: “I understand that the managements and teachers involved want to express their concerns. But this is clearly a political action, directed and coordinated by Vooruit representatives. Trying to score political points on the hood of the students, who are not receiving lessons that day due to the strike, is cynical and irresponsible.”

Measures work

Flemish Member of Parliament Annabel Tavernier emphasizes that Minister of Education Weyts has taken many measures during this legislature to reduce the teacher shortage. “With success in Brussels too, because the number of teachers is increasing and the turnaround seems to have begun. The measures have even worked better in Brussels than elsewhere in Flanders.” She notes that the teacher shortage is very unevenly distributed and hardly occurs in certain schools: “As in any company or organization, the atmosphere on the work floor in a school can play a role in the development of a teacher shortage. How a school is managed and implements its personnel policy is an important variable. The stronger the HR policy in a school, the smaller the problems with teacher shortage.”

Non-solution

The 22 schools approach Minister Weyts with a package of demands. One of these is a Brussels premium. “But that is a non-solution,” says Gilles Verstraeten. “The problems in Brussels do not so much have to do with remuneration, but with more than 85 percent of commuters in the profession and therefore problems in terms of distance, accessibility and mobility, the challenging reality in terms of student population in terms of language, discipline, tensions, in combination with educational choices and radical constructivist politics of the past compounding these problems. Throwing money now only creates the illusion that you are doing “something”. Pascal Smet (Vooruit) said this himself in 2009 when he was education minister!”

Hypocritical

Verstraeten therefore states that Vooruit is hypocritical and is now trying to blame Weyts for the problems that it has not addressed: “Pascal Smet stated in 2009, when there were also teacher shortages, that a Brussels premium would have no effect on the ground. If that were the case, you would simply create a problem elsewhere. Smet then believed that work had to be done in the long term, the teaching profession had to be revalued and that teachers had to regain the confidence to do what they do best: teaching! I fully agree with that, but the fact that we are still trying to turn that tanker 15 years later says a lot about what has not been done sufficiently or not at all in the past.”

Be constructive

Tavernier calls on Vooruit (and all other political parties) to take a constructive stance in this story: “Improving the quality of education is one of our greatest social challenges. It is significant that Vooruit in Flanders has abstained from voting on almost all measures to tackle the teacher shortage in the past. That is why I say clearly: contribute to solutions yourself instead of organizing such political actions.”