91998E0665

WRITTEN QUESTION E-0665/98 by Alexandros Alavanos (GUE/NGL) to the Commission (10 March 1998)

Subject: Employment of teachers in extra tuition programme for Greek lower secondary schools

The resolution of the Amsterdam European Council ((OJ C 236, 2.8.1997, p. 3. )) on growth and employment begins: 'It is imperative to give a new impulse for keeping employment at the top of the political agenda of the European Union.' The chapter on the organization of working time of Parliament's proposal to the extraordinary meeting of the European Council on employment states that where overtime is structural in nature, firms, unions and employers should reduce it and create additional jobs.

In Greece, extra tuition has been introduced as part of the package of measures designed to support the comprehensive secondary school system, which is funded through the Community Support Framework. Tuition is to be provided mainly by teachers who already hold posts working overtime, whereas there are thousands of teachers unemployed.

What measures will the Commission take to fill these new posts, which are being financed through the Community Support framework, with unemployed teachers?

Answer given by Mr Flynn on behalf of the Commission (16 April 1998)

The extra tuition courses to which the Honourable Member refers are for pupils in upper secondary education, in particular in the recently established integrated (or unified) lyceum. The aim of these courses, organised at this first transitional phase, is to help students adapt to the new requirements of the integrated lyceum (new courses, new curricula, new didactic approach). Their nature is temporary rather than structural and they will be given up to the end of the current Community support framework (CSF).

In addition, in the technical sheet of the action, the Greek authorities which implement the operation, explain that 'the teachers for the extra tuition courses are to be chosen by the teachers' association, in co-operation with school counsellors ... from neighbouring school units, or from among highly qualified teachers still without a post ...'. Moreover 'the teachers of a particular extra tuition section must not be those who give the corresponding regular classes to the pupils in question'.