Teachers and ministry in negotiations for five months trying to reach an agreement this week

Teachers’ unions and the Ministry of Education are resuming talks this week on a new teacher recruitment and placement system after the minister guaranteed “full accessibility” to career development discussions.

Since September, teacher and government representatives have been trying to negotiate a new model for the selection and placement of teachers, which the unions have also demanded.

The 6th round of talks starts on Thursday and the unions have already signaled that they may request additional meetings as there are still issues on which no agreement can be seen.

The possibility of principals being able to assign some teachers to two schools in the same QZP structure is one of the major contentious issues.

The current project provides for the creation of groups of directors – “Teaching Area Staff Councils” – responsible for the distribution of services and empowered to assign teachers to teach in two groups when they are on contract, or full-time teachers with less than eight teaching hours. Scheduled.

At the end of the 5th round of negotiations, last Friday, the unions said that if the measure does not fall, there will be no agreement. In the case of unions, boards of directors should retain their selection function only in the event of a temporary need for employment.

Another reason the unions have refused any kind of agreement is the government’s refusal to restore seniority frozen during the Troika.

Teachers say they are not giving up about six and a half years of service, noting that the government has “returned” that time to those who work in schools in the Azores and Madeira.

Until the guardianship comes up with a proposal for a timetable for discussing the issue, teachers will continue to protest, participating in demonstrations and strikes.

“Now there is full readiness on our part, once we have closed this matter with recruitment, to continue to sit at the table with trade union organizations to work on general career issues and very specific issues, such as the fight against bureaucracy. “, Education Minister Joao Costa announced on Friday, without specifying whether talks could go as far as restoring seniority.

Measures already agreed include holding internal competitions every year, adding more than 10,000 teachers later this year, and expanding from the current 10 Pedagogical Zone states to 63.

In the case of teachers who remain on contract, the guardianship promises there will be three pay scales so that they can go up based on length of service.

Until now, teachers have always been paid as if they were in the 1st tier, even if they have been teaching for several decades.

The offer of guardianship provides that after 1,095 days of service (equivalent to three years), the teacher will rise to the equivalent of the 2nd grade, and after another three years, he may rise again.

But there are career advancement requirements such as applying to schools with at least ten QZPs, accepting all placements, and completing contracts in full in the previous two years.

The guardianship proposal also provides for tougher penalties for teachers who refuse timetables, starting with two years’ placement deprivation (currently one).

Negotiations are under pressure, with unions calling for strikes that began in December and are expected to last until March, and the Ministry of Education is asking for minimal services.

After the Court of Arbitration ruled to declare minimum services for strikes indefinitely set by the Union of All Education Workers (STOP), the DOE has now decided to also request two regional strikes scheduled for March 2 and 3, which were an organized platform of trade union structures.