Europe 1 with AFP 8:12 p.m., August 25, 2022, modified at 8:17 p.m., August 25, 2022

“Our education system is approaching a breaking point,” said Stéphane Crochet, secretary general of SE-Unsa, one of the main unions in primary and secondary education.

The teacher shortage has prompted the government to recruit a large number of contract workers to ensure the start of the school year.

A week before the start of the school year, the SE-Unsa teachers' union warned Thursday of the "fragility" of the education system, tested by the health crisis due to Covid-19 and successive reforms and faced this year with a major recruitment crisis.

"Our education system is approaching a breaking point," said Stéphane Crochet, general secretary of SE-Unsa, one of the main unions in primary and secondary education, during a press conference.

The shortage of teachers, linked to the crisis of attractiveness of the profession, prompted the government to recruit a large number of contract workers to ensure the start of the school year.

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Despite this, "we are really not sure that we will succeed in having staff in each class. And beyond the start of the new school year, it is the weeks that follow that can be very difficult", he said. he warned, regretting the lack of anticipation of the replacements to be expected.

"This will not make it possible to cope with the whole school year," said the union official.

Need to secure the status of contractors

To prevent these difficulties, he calls, as the Snuipp-FSU did on Tuesday, to immediately recruit all the additional lists of competitions in order to secure the workforce.

And stresses the need to secure the status of contract workers and to review the salary grid for incumbents.

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Emmanuel Macron recalled Thursday before the rectors and rectors, gathered at the Sorbonne, the government's commitment to ensuring a salary of at least 2,000 euros net monthly to any new teacher.

Regarding this objective, Stéphane Crochet indicates that the SE-Unsa wanted this revaluation to benefit teachers "from the year of internship" and not from their tenure.

Moreover, "2,000 euros is a figure that we ourselves had set as a target", but "in 2020", he declared.

Given inflation, this amount should be revalued "today rather 2,200 euros", according to him.