As students gear up to head back to school this week for the first full post-COVID scholastic year, the teachers’ union said staff shortages are back to what they were in the 2018/2019 academic year, the number of new educators remaining too low. All students, from state, Church and independent schools, will be back in class by Wednesday and, although this year they will not be social distancing and wearing masks, Malta Union of Teachers (MUT) head Marco Bonnici said the issues experienced before the virus pandemic hit in 2020 persist. “In the past years, we have not had an influx of teachers joining the profession and, therefore, the issues we had in 2018/2019 are still with us,” Bonnici said. “We might even have staff who joined the education sector because they lost their job during the pandemic who might now be leaving again.” More teachers are needed in primary level as well as for the core and science subjects in secondary schools. An increase in the number of educators that teach vocational subjects is also required, he said. While actual numbers of missing educators will be known once everyone is back in school later in the week, Bonnici said he is already informed of...
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