TIRANA, September 12 /ATA/ The Democratic Party in opposition expressed congratulations on students and teachers on the first day of school today, but raised concerns about decrease of the number of students in the school benches.
MP Ina Zhupa wrote on social networks that the number of students attending school in the course of the last 15 years has decreased by 226 thousand students.
“Unfortunately, there are 226,000 less students in the school benches in 15 years. An alarming figure that clearly shows the depopulation of Albania due to mis-governance”, she emphasized.
Zhupa also focused on investments in education.
“But, even though there are fewer students, the absence of political will to bring money and investments to education has caused the problems to be even deeper than 15 years ago. From the promises of digital classes, even with 4 million Euros spent, we have moved on to used books and threats to children. Used books are far from being textbooks from which the child can learn and develop. The mockery of free textbooks continues on ERTV. Collective classes continue even though it should have been a reality in 2022. In the middle of Tirana, classes are still held in shifts. Meanwhile, there is a lack of internet in more than 50% of rural schools (according to the World Bank, only 47% of rural schools have access to the internet)”, said Zhupa.
The democrat MP also said that there was no real increase in salaries for teachers.
“Teachers’ salaries are a clear indicator of how this government has failed with education as well. From 2013 until now, taking into account the inflation and the increase in prices every year, there is almost no real salary increase under Edi Rama”, she added./p.s./
