Special school turning storerooms into classrooms, says AKEL Secretary General

Staff at the Nicosia Special School are having to turn storerooms and other spaces into classrooms because the school has run out of room, AKEL Secretary General Stefanos Stefanou said after visiting on Friday. “Space really has run out,” Stefanou said. He said the situation did no one credit and prevented teaching from being done properly. He added that the school needed school assistants. More generally, he called for greater effort, faster procedures and quicker action on school buildings and other facilities, such as shaded areas, sports areas and other special needs. Air conditioning Stefanou singled out the installation of air conditioning in schools . He said there was a long delay, despite announcements that the work would be finished by 2026. Even in schools where units have been installed, he said, there are problems: either there isn’t enough electrical capacity to run them, or there are faults in the electrical installations that raise safety concerns. He said the Education Ministry should have put all of this into a plan with specific timetables, monitoring and pressure, so that installation could be completed as quickly as possible and children and teachers would be safe. Ministry’s responsibility Stefanou called on the ministry to take responsibility for solving schools ‘ problems. He said it could not shift that responsibility onto school boards, and sometimes parents’ associations, to get things done, although he acknowledged the important role both play. Wider problems Stefanou praised teachers , who he said often work in difficult conditions and face many problems in getting the job done. He called their work, like education itself, an investment in the country’s future. But he said their efforts were often undermined or limited by the many problems in schools. These include old buildings in need of renovation, a shortage of classrooms and schools still operating in prefabricated buildings. Asked about staffing problems at the start of the school year, mainly in secondary education, he said teachers’ unions were still raising concerns about transfers, secondments and placements of teachers, which continue even after lessons have started. He said this disrupted the start and smooth running of the school year. The repetition of the same problems time after time showed that the necessary action was not being taken, he said. Next steps Stefanou said AKEL would keep making proposals and contributing constructively, but that an opposition party could not solve problems or take on responsibilities that belong to the government and the ministry. Once the visits are over, he said, the party will raise the issues in the House and submit memoranda, to point out the problems, propose solutions and press the government and the Education Ministry to act as soon as possible. The visits, which also took in the 3rd Primary School of Pallouriotissa, are part of an AKEL tour of schools across Cyprus. Its aim is to record problems through talks with teachers and to push proposals to address them. (Information from Cyprus News Agency)