Published on January 9, 2026, the Regulation on the Appointment and Relocation of Teachers Affiliated to the Ministry of National Education has, among many other controversies, brought the ‘rotation of teachers’ debate back to the agenda. We say it has brought it to the agenda again, because the previous regulation also had a rotation regulation, but it could not be implemented due to the reactions from the education public.
The regulation is included in Article 28 of the relevant regulation under the heading “Maximum working time of teachers in the same educational institution” as follows;
“Teachers may serve in the same educational institution for a maximum of 12 years in total. Teachers who have been working in the same educational institution for a total of 12 years as of September 30th of the year of relocation shall be assigned to educational institutions in need of teachers in their fields in the district groups determined by the governorships, taking into account the geographical situation and transportation conditions, within a maximum of two months from the end of the school year upon the announcement to be made, in line with their preferences, according to the superiority of service points. The appointments of those who cannot be assigned to their preferences and those who do not make a preference are made ex officio by the governorships to the educational institutions in the district groups where there is a need for teachers in their fields, starting from the one with the highest tenure in the same educational institution.”
Education unions reacted as soon as the regulation was published! While the authorized union Eğitim Bir Sen did not mention the rotation issue in its evaluation, it brought up other issues related to the regulation.
Eğitim İş believes that a teacher's long tenure in an educational institution cannot be a reason for relocation on its own. Relocating a teacher means not only changing the place of duty, but also his/her home, living arrangements and social environment. Teachers are the element that gives identity to schools. Teachers integrate with the school's environment, parents and students over time. Compulsory rotation breaks this bond and leads to a loss of trust in the school-environment relationship. Especially in areas such as classroom teaching, where continuity and trust are essential, this practice will not benefit, but will cause clear harm. In educational institutions, ex officio assignment cannot be defended on pedagogical grounds.
At the time of writing, other unions had not yet made a statement, but it is remembered that Eğitim Sen and Türk Eğitim Sen have made statements against rotation in the past. In this sense, we expect both unions to make statements in this direction in the coming days.
There is a lot of talk in the education public that teacher rotation will not be implemented this semester as it was in the past, but we believe that it will be implemented this semester. The reason is that while in the previous regulation, rotation practices were to be carried out at the district level, in the new regulation it will be done through district groups. While rotation in a single district cannot achieve its purpose, rotation within district groups will achieve the desired goal.
The district grouping arrangement is to divide the districts in a province into two or three groups and apply the rotation arrangement among these groups. The district group arrangement expands the scope of rotation.
According to the Turkish Language Institution (2015), the concept of rotation, which is of French origin, is used in the meanings of ‘relocation, rotation, rotation or regular replacement of officials working in an organization’. There are various studies in the literature not on teacher rotation but on the rotation of school administrators.
In a study, it was emphasized that rotation has many benefits. One of the benefits of rotation is to prevent problems such as stagnation, routine and boredom caused by working in the same organization for a long time. Gaining new knowledge and skills through change, new experiences, getting rid of monotony, providing new excitement to the organization and individuals are among the benefits of rotation.
Again, in the study conducted on the compulsory relocation of primary school administrators, all of the administrators thought that the positive aspects of the rotation practice were more positive than the negative aspects. In addition, administrators stated that compulsory relocation was more useful in the following areas:
-Developing the leadership skills of managers,
- Having a wide range by working with different staff,
- Providing professional development by working with different teachers
- Avoiding staticity by seeing different administrative challenges,
- Finding different solutions to the problems encountered,
- Taking an active role in providing the instructional needs of the environment in which they live.
As for any organization, educational organizations have to overcome the resistance to change and organize innovation according to environmental needs. While good management requires an effective leadership style, the management of change depends on the correct understanding of the philosophy of change by the organization. In the management of change in the school organization, besides the management skills of the school principal, the quality of the relationship between the organization and its environment is decisive. Because the dynamic or static structure of the environment both affects and is affected by the change in the school. While factors such as the professional and personal qualifications of the school principal, environmental influences and the structure of the organization are important variables in management success, the fact that school principals work in the same institution for a long time is seen as a risk factor for effective management and change. Problems such as management blindness, monotony, increased complacency, stagnation, inability to see problems or insistence on similar solutions to problems may arise. Working in the same organization for a long time leads to problems such as blindness and desensitization to problems, monotony in functioning, and closedness to innovations.
In our view, it is obvious that working in a school for a long period of time will lead to various negative consequences such as monotony, increased complacency, stagnation, inability to see problems or insistence on similar solutions to problems, blindness and desensitization to problems, uniformity in functioning, resistance to change, and the disruption of school culture as a result of the spread of informal relations.
Sources:
Alpaslan GÖZLER, Zehra MENGÜÇ, Sevda GÜZEL, Yasemin BABADAĞI:
An Examination of Academic Articles on the Mandatory Rotation of School Administrators.
Bülent Sarıkaya, Osman Keleş:
Examining the Opinions of School Principals Regarding the Mandatory Rotation Application.