Let’s start things from the beginning, because this is an issue that the Ministry of Education should solve immediately, as it is an injustice that thousands of teachers are facing.

According to law 4589/2019 the right of appointment is recognized in teachers with recognized experience from private educationonly if they have served in public education as substitutes for at least 2 “full academic years”where a “full” academic year is defined as 10 months for Secondary and 9 months and 21 days for Primary.

However, thousands of teachers lose their right to be appointed, as they complain, as well as OIELE (Federation of Private Educational Officers of Greece), as the two-year term is not completed for just 3 days!

And why is this happening, one might reasonably ask… Even though the teachers, who were hired as substitutes in September of this school year, were working normally, the hiring decision was announced on September 4th, instead of even being announced on September 1st, so that the their seniority is counted from the beginning of the school year.

Understandably, this results in thousands of teachers being ‘out’ of recruitment because they lack a minimum number of days of service and cannot complete the coveted two years.

OIELE also issued a statement on the issue, asking the Ministry of Education to examine the issue more carefully and correct this specific injustice.

“One of the main requests of the Federation in the last five years is the abolition of the regulation of the aforementioned provision. However, since we are under no illusions and know that we have strong “opponents” in front of us, we ask that, if this unacceptable regulation is not abolished, at least it should be implemented with the will of the legislator. For someone to have taught for two years and not be condemned officially, morally and financially for 3 or 4 days, because the state makes savings! Therefore, either the appointments should be made (as they should be) on the first day of September, or the academic two-year period should be recognized from the day the academic (not school) year begins”says the announcement.

The announcement in detail:

“It is with great pleasure that we find in the last few days that, finally, collectives from public education are activated for the unacceptable, provocative and discriminatory treatment of substitutes from private education. Of course, we remind all colleagues that this tragic situation is not new. The law defining the recognition of previous service in private education and the conditions for the appointment of teachers with tenure in our sector was passed in 2019 (Law 4589/2019). In other words, this is not a new law and this year is not the first year that our colleagues have been subjected to this miserable treatment by the state. Better late than never and we hope our concerted action will bear fruit.

Injustice 1: The mandatory two years of service as an alternate on the board

Law 4589/2019 contained an important regulation for us, after a huge effort by the Federation against “gods and demons” (those serving at the time know well what we are referring to). It recognized, based on the parity of public and private teachers, 120 seniority points. However, and for reasons that we prefer not to refer to, putting as a primary issue the unity of the field of education, it was decided legislatively to make it difficult for dismissed private teachers to be appointed by placing a clause of staying for two full academic years in a substitute or hourly wage position. Article 61 of the Law (par. g, para. bb) states:

“Private teachers for whom prior service in private education is counted in accordance with this case, are not appointed if, at the time of appointment, they have not completed substitute or hourly service in public schools for at least two (2) full academic years.”

We private teachers are not ignorant. We do not forget that this particular law recognized our previous service as a real public service (something that was not a given in previous years), but this provision was unfair and obliged people with many years of, often hard, service in private education to remain in substitute status, with all that entails. And, unfortunately, as we will show below, the 2 full academic years are rarely completed in two years!

Injustice 2: For a few days, privately trained deputies lose a full year of seniority!

We mentioned above that teachers with previous experience in private education are required to serve two full academic years as substitutes and hourly. Those who proposed the provision were well aware that almost no private teacher will be able to complete two teaching years in two years. Because this; Because the completion of a full academic year requires the recruitment to take place on September 1st exactly. Not even a day later. Something that almost never happens, as the state, in neglect of its due legal action in order to save costs, proceeds to appoint deputies after September 4-5. This practically means that our colleagues are obliged to work for three years as substitutes, which dramatically reduces their chances of a permanent appointment and puts them to an additional mental, moral and financial test. Even worse, some are not hired for a third year, with the result that for 1-2 days they cannot establish the right to a permanent appointment!

It is a given that the Minister of Education, Religious Affairs and Sports, Kyriakos Pierrakakis, has open ears, but also the will to correct this specific injustice and remove this distortion at the expense of teachers.