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At its 30th Executive Council meeting, the Kurdistan Teachers’ Union emphasised the need for the Iraqi region’s public authorities to ensure quality teacher training, a quality education environment and counter the rampant privatisation in the sector.

On the 4th of August the leaders of the Kurdistan Teachers’ Union (KTU) discussed the implementation of resolutions adopted at Education International (EI) 8th World Congress, held in Bangkok last month. Also on the agenda were the KTU general election to be held on the 31st November 2019, prior to the union’s 13th Conference, and the visit of an EI delegation to Iraq and the Kurdistan Region at the end of November 2019.

Addressing the KTU meeting, Pishtiwan Sadiq, Kurdistan’s Education Minister, presented his work programme which included:

• Organising the teaching staff
• Paying attention to teachers’ qualification and training
• Ensuring the teachers’ supervision institution runs smoothly
• Managing private education and its methods and reducing the differences between public and private education – 4 % of education centres in Kurdistan are currently private
• Guaranteeing quality school buildings and finding solutions to the shortcomings in education institutions.

The Minister’s speech was followed by a questions and answers session where KTU members expressed their concerns regarding teacher appointment, required specialisation and filling vacancies resulting from leaves and retirements.

KTU also highlighted the need for teacher unionists to contribute to all resolutions and proposals on teacher and education policies and demanded that the Education Ministry’s councils and committees include union representatives.