Govt must improve teachers’ salary package

Education Minister James Ma­rape said 20% of the national budget would be spent on education.
He described it as one of the greatest investments in PNG’s development.
The minister also said student’s enrolment had increased by 6.9% since 1995 and that the department was on track to achieve its goal of providing universal basic education for all.
The reality faced by teachers in classrooms around PNG is:
* The majority of schools throughout PNG do not have proper facilities and resources to cater for the challenges of OBE or curriculum reform;
* The teacher-student ratio is no longer 1:4 but more like 1:40;
* OBE gives teachers more work and the teacher-student ratio should be less if the government wants a quality output; and
* Teachers start work from as early as 7am and finish as late as 10pm and they cannot claim OT, yet they never complain.
I call on the government and Education Department to recruit more teachers but in order to attract more people into this profession, the salary package of tea­chers must be improved.
Otherwise, we are not likely to meet the mission statement as stated in Vision 2050 which clearly spells out education as one of the pillars of development. 

Silent observer
Port Moresby