As the world marks the Teachers' Day today, there is an intense debate in Egypt concerning the lack of education infrastructure and the shortage of teachers – as an estimate of 470,000 teachers are needed nationwide. Egyptian teachers are struggling with their low salaries, placing them at the bottom of the pay hierarchy, compared to other government sectors. This comes amid a sharp decline in public spending on education, which has led to a decline in educational services over the past decades.

5th of October marks The World Teachers' Day every year since 1994, which marked the anniversary of the signing of the 1966 ILO/UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Teachers, which sets forth the rights and responsibilities of teachers, and standards for their initial preparation and further training. 

This year, UNESCO is organizing events that emphasize the need to hear teachers' perceptions of education and integrate them into education policy, under the theme “Valuing teacher voices: Towards a new social contract for education”. This focus on teachers comes due to the significant role played by teachers in the educational process, and in building new generations that help achieve progress and sustainable development in society.

Egypt's 2014 constitution highlights the importance of teachers in Article 22, which states: “Teachers and faculty members and their assistants are the main pillars of education. The State shall guarantee the development of their academic competencies and professional skills and shall care for their financial and moral rights in order to ensure the quality of education and achieve its goals.” However, teachers in Egypt suffer from low salaries, a deterioration in the status of their profession, and a decline in the development of their skills.

Low salaries lead many teachers to rely on private lessons as a source of income or work in a second  job to make ends meet and cope with the economic hardship and rising inflation. The teachers’ preoccupation with seeking compensation for their low income weakens the educational process, taking into account the density of students in classes. All this affects students' academic achievement and ability follow-up in the classroom, turning schools into an unattractive environment for teaching and learning.

However, the education sector has a severe shortage of teachers, estimated at nearly half a million teachers, as a result of the prolonged suspension of employment amid austerity policies pursued by the government, something which negatively affected the quality of the educational process.

In an attempt to ease this shortage, the government hires part-time teachers on temporary contracts, at a rate of 50 pounds per class. This exposes those teachers to job and financial insecurity, as the state requires those teachers not to demand employment after the expiry of their temporary contracts.

The government plans to hire 150,000 teachers over five years, an average of 30,000 teachers per year. However, at the end of the first batch competition, thousands of teachers were disqualified despite passing the tests set by the Ministry of Education. They were disqualified through tests conducted at the Military Academy, in violation of the ministry's announcement which did not include these tests. Also, the tests included discriminatory and racist criteria, such as the exclusion of overweight teachers and women who undergo physical transformations like pregnancy. These tests do not serve the educational process. It was better to save time and effort to train, develop and prepare those teachers well in these early years, as this would serve students.

The case of disqualified teachers has been pending before the State Council for more than a year, at a time when schools need teachers. Therefore, it is important to cancel the Military Academy tests, as they do not benefit the educational process, are unconstitutional, and violate international laws and conventions.

Hence, the teachers excluded from the first batch competition should be appointed, and the circle of employment – along with the current competitions – should be expanded to include the experienced part-time teachers, after testing their educational and teaching skills.

As the government aims to recruit 50,000 part-time teachers this year, this opportunity could be seized to provide additional training to those teachers during the recruitment period, which would further qualify them to be appointed. The 30,000 teachers to be appointed annually are too small in number compared to the number of retirees per year. In this context, public education employed 804.6 thousand teachers in 2023/2024 compared to 830.4 thousand in 2022/2023, which means that 25,000 teachers left the public sector within a year, according to data from the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics.

In addition to solving the shortage of teachers, there should be plans for developing and training teachers on a permanent basis, so they get acquainted with modern educational curricula and teaching methods in a sustainable manner. The presence of highly qualified teachers would contribute to building a strong society based on critical thinking and sustainability of learning and knowledge. Therefore, it is important to invest in the training of teachers and providing them with an adequate income so they can focus on education, taking into account the student-teacher ratio. Providing a decent income for teachers would make the job attractive to the most qualified individuals and raise the teacher's status in society.

It is important to involve teachers in the development of educational policies, and to take their views regarding the curriculum into account. It is also important to apply the constitutional proportions in education, as this would help implement these plans and address the challenges facing the entire educational process. We see the UNESCO celebration as an opportunity to establish a new social contract for teachers in Egypt, and we believe that teachers should come first.