University has no right to hinder student-teachers – unions

The Forum of Maltese Unions said the limit on students entering the University of Malta to pursue a Bachelor’s degree in education was tantamount to adopting the infamous ‘numerus clausus’.

Forum president John Bencini, a former presdident of teachers’ union MUT, told MaltaToday that if the university was happy to receive so many foreign students from all over the world, it could restrict Maltese students from pursuing a career in teaching at the Faculty of Education.

“It is most unjust and unfair to all those students who were enthusiastically waiting to commence their university years to find out at a very late hour that their future is indeed shattered,” Bencini said about B.Ed prospects who could not be given teaching placements as part of their degree course.

Bencini said it was a known fact that “a good number” of teachers are refusing to be temporarily replaced by student-teachers and that even parents tend to be disapproving of the practice.

“The reason why some teachers refuse to be replaced is because they either end up replacing other teachers in their own school who are on sick leave, or because they are often asked to perform other duties which are not part of their job description.”

Bencini said the solution is to allow these teachers to act as mentors during the teaching placement period and not end up filling gaps.

The university students council KSU said it could not encourage students to pursue a course that had limited career prospects, claiming the demand for teachers was not high.

But Bencini said that while pupils’ intake in primary and secondary school will gradually decrease in the coming years, the intake of teachers will not be varying as much.

“There are students these days who opt to obtain a B.Ed degree with the intention of working in schools abroad. During the last few years a number of teachers chose to teach in the UK, Italy, Spain and other countries. Our University has absolutely no right to hinder such students from obtaining the qualifications they require to reach such aim.

“Apart from the natural wastage, quite a few teachers are leaving the profession to seek new pastures or even work abroad in an EU country. Quite a number of teachers are promoted to assistant heads, apart from the fact that if the principles of quality education emphasised in the Tomorrow’s Schools 1995 and Creating The Future Together 1999 policies are to become a reality, the maximum number of children in every classroom should diminish,” Bencini said.