- Title: Teachers concerned by Egypt's new decisions regarding high school system
- Date: 3rd October 2024
- Summary: GIZA, EGYPT (SEPTEMBER 22, 2024) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS AT PLAYGROUND CAIRO, EGYPT (SEPTEMBER 23, 2024) (REUTERS) EGYPTIAN FLAG NEXT TO EGYPTIAN SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY FLAG (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) EGYPTIAN MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT REPRESENTING EGYPTIAN SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY, FREDDY ELBAIADY, SAYING: "The main objection was the way the development took place
- Embargoed: 17th October 2024 11:03
- Keywords: Education Egypt Society
- Location: CAIRO AND GIZA, EGYPT
- City: CAIRO AND GIZA, EGYPT
- Country: Egypt
- Topics: Education,Middle East,Society/Social Issues
- Reuters ID: LVA001877102102024RP1
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: An abrupt decision by Egypt’s new education minister to remove several core subjects from final year exams for high school students has exposed the strains on an under-resourced and highly competitive schooling system in the country.
The move to cut a foreign language and either geology, psychology or philosophy from the subjects that count towards university entrance grades affects hundreds of thousands of students, many of whom are scrambling to adjust their plans for continuing their studies and finding a job.
Tens of thousands of teachers will be reassigned and may struggle to replace supplementary income earned through private tutoring.
Among those is French language teacher, Hussein Aboul Eineen, who has been teaching high school students for 40 years. As the grade of a final examination in a second foreign language will not be counted towards final grades of high schoolers according to the new decisions, students won't bother taking private tutoring, which will affect the income of teachers like him.
He had to lay off 15 teaching assistants who used to help him at the private tutoring centres he frequents.
"Even I don't have a job in the first place," he smiles.
He is left with his monthly salary as a teacher employed by the government, which he says is not enough to live a "decent life".
The Egyptian government has vowed to fight private tutoring and considers it one of the biggest challenges facing the educational system in the country, but critics say teachers' low pay and the resulting deteriorating schooling system have shunned students away from public schools.
The new decisions aim to lift the burden off the students and their parents, by decreasing the number of subjects counting towards final high school scores, essential for university entrance in Egypt, Education Minister Mohammed Abdellatif said in a news conference in August. He added that decreasing the number of subjects or combining some of them would help teachers better manage their time, all as part of efforts to develop the education sector.
But critics say the decisions are attempted to reduce government spending on education.
According to the Alternative Policy Solutions centre at the American University in Cairo, government spending on education has increased monetarily as inflation soared over the years, but declined in terms of total government spending and as a percentage of GDP.
As of 2023-2024, total government spending on education as a percentage of GDP reached 1.9 percent according to ministry of finance and the approved government budget, declining from 2.1 percent the year before, the centre further explained. The constitution obliges the government to spend on public education a total of 4 percent as a percentage of GDP.
Education ministry officials were not available for comment.
"We have a problem of spending on education in Egypt," says researcher in the right to education unit at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR). "When we had a chance within the three years around the year 2017 that we reach the minimum level stipulated in the constitution (4 percent of total GDP) but the government circumvents these percentages," he added.
(Production: Sayed Sheasha, Ahmed Fahmy, Mai Shams El-Din) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
- Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2024. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
- Usage Terms/Restrictions: None