Educators in the region are chronically dissatisfied with their salaries, which is why local teachers are preparing for a strike.
The average salary of teachers in Montenegro is lower than the national average, and the situation is similar in Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH).
Their union representatives, on the other hand, warn that the salary is not the only problem - the relationship between the state, parents and students has brought educators to the margins of society.
Protests and strikes announced in Sarajevo Canton
If by February 19 there is no agreement with the Government regarding the salary increase, which, according to the representatives of the Education Union, is due to them according to the Branch Collective Agreement (GKU), the teachers will radicalize the protests from February 19.
They will come to the institutions where they work from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m., but they will not hold classes.
Such a model of a general strike, said the president of the Education Union recently Radomir Božović, supports more than 60 percent of teachers in primary and secondary schools.
The additional radicalization of the strike was announced by the teachers from Pljevlja - they will start a hunger strike on February 26, if an agreement on salary increase with the Ministry of Education, Science and Innovation is not reached by that date.
According to the data of the Directorate for Statistics (Monstat), the average salary in education in December 2023 was 810 euros, which is four euros lower than the national average.
Protests and strikes are also being prepared in Sarajevo Canton (KS) in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
"Collective agreements in KS have existed since 2006. Since 2010, they have been more favorable for workers. However, the Union of Primary Education and Education of KS is going all the way in the fight for children and workers, and we are preparing for a protest on February 14, as well as a general strike. Workers in preschool and elementary education institutions and their union representatives remained principled and committed to the fight for children and workers' rights," he told us. Saudi Silver, the president of the Trade Union.
The union states that salaries in education are among the lowest compared to salaries in other sectors.
"The basic salaries in other sectors are up to 50 percent higher than the salaries of workers in kindergartens and primary schools in the KS area," said Sivro.
The salary of a primary school teacher in KS is 1.524 KM (about 750 euros), in ZE-DO Canton 1.533 KM (about 780 euros), Posavska County 1.459 (about 775 euros), HNK 1.448 KM (about 740 euros), TK 1.416 KM (about 700 euros), BPK 1.409 KM (about 700 euros), ZHK 1.395 KM (about 700 euros), USK 1.295 KM (about 650 euros), RS up to 1.640 KM, which is the average amount of a high school teacher.
"The salary of employees in preschool institutions and primary schools in the area of USK is currently the lowest in FBiH. The collective agreement is essentially solid and respected. The problems of educators are also the constant departure of families, which causes a decrease in the number of classes and an increase in technological redundancy. This causes stress for teachers, because they are in a state of uncertainty. We have no understanding there and currently only we have lists of technological surplus. Next is the imposition of new jobs and tasks for which teachers are not sufficiently educated and which create additional stress for them. The status of educators is further undermined by the work of non-accredited educational institutions that issue diplomas with which people are employed. Increasing pressure from parents for whom grades in certain subjects are more important than the child's knowledge. "Unfortunately, the authorities in Bosnia and Herzegovina still treat education as an expense, not as an investment in the future," she explained Zehra Hadzic president of the FBiH Association of Social Workers - USK.
Increase in stages or all at once?
The starting salary of a teacher with a seventh degree and with the latest increase of 10 percent is so much lower than the average of the Republic of Serbia, he pointed out. Srdjan Slovic, president of the Branch Union of Serbian Educators "Nezavisnost", who reminds that in the protocol signed in October last year with representative education unions, the Government committed itself that the basic salary of teachers will reach the national average by January 1, 2025.
"It has not been abandoned and no one denies that it will not be fulfilled, but there is still no clear position on whether it will go in stages or all at once," says Slovic.
At the beginning of February, employees in education received the first part of their January salary since the new labor price came into effect, so the basic salary of a beginner teacher is now 86.680 dinars (739 euros).
The Independent Union of Educational Workers of Serbia (NSPRS) warns that the basic salary of a school teacher with a university education in Serbia in 2009 was 2,89 times higher than the minimum salary.
Since then, that relationship has changed to the detriment of educators, so today professors receive only 1,74 times the minimum wage.
"If this trend continues, in eight years, professors will be working for the lowest guaranteed salary in the country, as unqualified manual workers," NSPRS points out.
In order to avoid this disastrous fate, it is necessary, they say, to change the method of calculating earnings in education.
The NSPRS proposal is that the basis for calculating the salary in education should be the minimum wage in the Republic of Serbia, and the coefficients would range from 1,05 for a manual worker to 2,3 for a teacher with the seventh degree of expertise.
The proposal also contains a provision that the coefficients are increased by 0,20 in the name of holiday pay and hot meals for employees. By applying this proposal, a university-educated professor would always earn at least 2,4 state minimum wages.
"Government representatives say that we have the best finances in the region. However, if we compare our salaries with those of our colleagues in the region, we see how much the state has humiliated us. Not to mention Slovenia and Croatia, which are far behind us. We really have a higher GDP than Republika Srpska and BiH, we are at the level of Montenegro, and Macedonia is slightly below us. But the basic salary of teachers in Montenegro and Republika Srpska is 100 euros higher than in Serbia, it is also higher in BiH, even their teacher with about 30 years of service has almost two average salaries, and we are fighting and asking for only that one average". Slovic said earlier.
He notes that it should also be borne in mind that the remuneration system in neighboring countries is different than in Serbia, that is, that past work amounts to at least 0,5 percent per year of service, and in Montenegro from 0,5 to XNUMX percent.
Negotiations, but also preparations for radicalization
At the end of the year, the percentages forced Montenegrin teachers to protest, and a general strike was announced.
At the end of December 2022, the education union signed the GKU with the Government in a technical mandate, and they claim that this document guarantees them that all the coefficients of complexity will increase by 20 percent from January 1 last year, i.e. by an additional 10 percent from January this year.
Vlada Milojko Spajić, who was elected in the meantime, did not include that increase in the budget for this year, with the explanation that there is no money. According to estimates, an increase of about 14.000 employees would cost the state an additional 18 million euros.
The GKU provision, over which the Trade Union and the Government are arguing, predicts that, depending on the macroeconomic parameters and spending limits that will be determined for 2023 and 2024, in accordance with the Law on Budget and Fiscal Responsibility, job complexity coefficients "will be additionally considered, on for which a special agreement of the contracting parties will be adopted by the end of fiscal years 2023 and 2024". A year after the adoption of the new GKU, Article 79 was not acted upon either, which stipulates that the contracting parties, that is, the Ministry and the Union of Education, form a commission for the implementation, monitoring, application and interpretation of the GKU, on a parity basis, of three representatives of each contracting party.
Recently, a mixed commission was formed to negotiate changes to the GKU. In parallel with that, said Božović, the preparations of the educators for the strike are underway. The decision to go on strike was submitted to the Ministry of Education last week, and if they do not come to an agreement soon, the educators will suspend classes. Members of the Main Board of the Education Union also initiated a dispute before the Agency for Peaceful Dispute Resolution, which is just one step before a lawsuit against the state.
"If a compromise solution is reached in the coming days, the decision on the strike will be withdrawn, and we will also withdraw what we submitted to the Agency for Peaceful Dispute Resolution. We hope that there will be no strike", said Božović.
And the Government has put its offer on the table - if the teachers are patient, they could receive at least 15 percent higher net salary by the end of September at the latest.
"Educators have been offered a salary increase in the net amount of at least 15 percent, which would be applied no later than the end of the third quarter of this year... Once again, we note that it is necessary to apply sustainable solutions that will not jeopardize the functioning of the system, and on the other hand, will lead to the systematic improvement of the position of educators in society, which, we hope, is the goal of all participants in the conversation", said the Ministry of Education.
Negotiations are ongoing, and if there is no compromise and a strike occurs, it will be the first large, radical protest by educators in 22 years.
At that time, it took 10 months of strike and negotiations for educators to increase their salaries by eight percent.
It is true, however, that they did not separate themselves from the students during those months - they chose the option not to suspend classes, but to shorten the class to 25 minutes.
The strike then ended with the signing of an agreement, after which the teachers' salaries began to increase through the collective agreement, i.e. its amendments. From then until today, every change was preceded by a process of negotiations, but there were no more strikes, because the Law on Strikes was passed just after that rebellion of educators, and they were prevented from demanding their rights in that way. The regulation has been changed in the meantime, but the Act on the minimum work process for the field of education from 2006, which is still valid today, has not been changed, and provides that classes must not be suspended.
In the shadow of the percentages this time in Montenegro, the problems in education remained - more and more classes in city schools, inappropriate working conditions, pressure from parents to improve their grades at the end of the year even though they do not deserve it, the accumulation of administrative work on the backs of teachers...
Bonus video:
