About 600 teachers asked for free vacation, SBASK: worrying, leaving for European countries

United Kosovo Education, Science and Culture Union ( The USAK has raised concern after about 600 teachers have asked for free breaks so they can leave the country. From the Edgood Institute, they say this free break cannot be directly linked to the migration of teachers. Director Rinor Qehaja says the learning process is not at risk, and there is actually too much teaching.

USBAK Vice President Vjollca Shala has said that prior to the start of the 2023-2024 school year at the Municipal Education Directorate have applied over 300 free school teachers. According to her, most of them have taken this holiday in order to leave Kosovo and go find themselves somewhere in different European states.

According to her, this number has increased after visa liberalisation. On the second half-year of the 2023/24 school year near 600 teachers have asked for free break.

“Yes, before the start of the 2023-2024 school year request at the Municipal Education Directorate has made over 300 free break teachers, and they have largely made these requests in order to leave Kosovo and find themselves somewhere in different European states. But with visa liberalisation now as the second half-year of the 2023/4 school year begins, this number has increased, which according to information we have from the educator is about 500 or 600 teachers for this year”, she said.

Shala has said there are also teachers who without even applying to the Municipal Directorate are leaving the country, which she said is a very disturbing alarm.

“Whether it's those who applied to the municipal directorates for free breaks or we have now the teaching that without making demands on the Communist Directorates are leaving our country going to different countries in Europe. This is a very disturbing alarm because in the near future, if this trend of teaching from Kosovo continues, our schools will be left without Albanian language teacher”, she has said of EO.

While the director of the EdGard Institute, Rinor Qehaja, has said he does not believe that receiving free break from teachers has any direct relationship with migration abroad.

According to him, these statistics can only be derived from municipalities and the Ministry of Finance and after the end of the free break.

I don't believe the free break being taken by a number of teachers has any direct relationship with migration abroad. This is statistics, which can only be extracted from municipalities and the Ministry of Finance and that after the end of the free holiday. At the end of the day is the category of vacation legally belonging to any teacher and any other public official,”, he said.

Qehaja has indicated that there are over 2,000 teachers in the country who are excessive within the education system, and that without regard for situations there is no possibility of the learning process being violated.

The teacher's profession luckily still very attractive for employment. I remind you that we have an enormous number of graduates waiting for teaching recruits. At the same time, I remind you that we have over 2,000 teachers who are too much in the education system, so in each case, I don't appreciate that in any case, I don't appreciate that any eventual career movement between teaching and changing jobs, and then I can affect the” teaching process, Qehaja has indicated.