According to TDK, a crisis is defined as a difficult period, crisis or depression (economic/political) in the life of a country, organization or individual. This word of French origin also figuratively means dangerous moment, turning point of diseases, extreme scarcity of something or sudden desire. A crisis refers to a sudden and serious situation that destabilizes a system.
According to the OECD (Teaching and Learning International Survey) International Teaching and Learning Survey-2024, one of the most important teaching problems is the lack of adequately equipped teachers. .0 of secondary school administrators interviewed for TALIS say that the shortage of adequately equipped teachers limits the capacity for quality education in their schools. The situation in Turkey is close to the OECD average: .34 in primary school, .7 and .1 in secondary school.
The teaching profession in Turkey is in crisis! But not for the same reasons as the crisis in OECD countries, but for other reasons, reasons specific to Turkey!
The teaching crisis in Turkey is concentrated on quality rather than quantity, working conditions, assignment processes and workforce planning, and is generally related to practices related to teacher employment.
In this sense, we can take a detailed look at the issues that constitute the sub-headings of the teaching crisis in Turkey.
Between 2023 and 2026, the topics of unassigned teachers, the Law on the Teaching Profession and the career ladder, inadequate appointments, unfair interviews, the opening of the National Education Academies despite the objections of teachers and education faculties, ex-officio appointments in project schools, the regulation of district groups, private school teachers, norm staff deficits and the employment of paid teachers were frequently discussed in the public.
Let us examine step by step how the teaching crisis unfolded in Turkey;
-First of all, we can start talking about unassigned teachers. In Turkey, there has been a problem of unassigned teachers for many years, not only during the Yusuf Tekin period, due to the lack of coordination between the Higher Education Council and the Ministry of National Education. This is a long and arduous process in which young people who go to education faculties with high hopes are disappointed and abandoned to the ruthless wheels of the private school-counseling center sector. The disappointment of unassigned teachers has increased even more with the insufficient number of appointments in recent years, and the restructuring of the National Education Academy has added salt and pepper to the process.
-Secondly, with the Law on the Teaching Profession, the teaching profession has been transformed into a system of segregation where teachers doing the same job receive different salaries only because of professional seniority. Salary differences of 10,000-20,000 TL have emerged between a new teacher and an expert and a head teacher. If there is to be a career ladder, professional seniority should not be a valid criterion for teacher quality, instead academic education should be the determining criterion.
-Thirdly, a look at the number of teacher appointments between 2003 and 2024 shows that the number of appointments has fallen dramatically.
-2003: 22.814
-2004: 19.029
-2005: 20.777
-2006: 50.877
-2007: 45.420
-2008: 40.709
-2009: 30.216
-2010: 40.921
-2011: 39.945
-2012: 56.106
-2013: 41.579
-2014: 50.990
-2015: 52.736
-2016: 49.311
-2017: 20.857
-2018: 25.577
-2019: 41.379
-2020: 40.925
-2021: 21.407
-2022: 34.682
-2023: 44.573
-2024: 19.968
-2025: 15 000
-2026: 10 thousand teachers were recruited to the National Education Academy, but training has not started yet.
-Fourthly, the interview process experienced by 2023 KPSS applicants is the most important reason for the teaching crisis. The interview process, which started in the summer of 2024 and was completed in the summer of 2024, led to so many incomprehensible practices that it would take pages to write about each one! The interview practices were not scientific and objective, each commission did not make similar evaluations, commission members did not evaluate candidate teachers according to their branches, different scores were given in each province, candidate teachers could not fully reflect their potential due to health problems, and some candidates experienced excitement or stress during the interview. In this sense, the recent proposal by MHP Group Deputy Chairperson Prof. Dr. Filiz Kılıç to amend the Law on Teaching Profession is an important step towards correcting this injustice.
-Fifthly, the establishment of the National Academy of Education and the assignment of the task of teacher training to this institution, in a sense taking it away from the faculties of education. Since we have covered this issue in many of our articles, it is sufficient to state that the purpose of the establishment of the National Education Academy will not have any function other than training the government's teachers and standardizing teachers in line with the ideology of the government.
-Sixthly, we can say that ex officio appointments to project schools and schools other than project schools constitute examples that contradict the jurisprudence of Turkish administrative law. Ex officio appointments made without any criteria or based on lists sent by unions affiliated to the ruling bloc have been overturned by administrative courts every time, yet these appointments have continued to be made. We can say that the recent amendments to the MEB Regulation on Teacher Appointment and Relocation are far from solving the problem.
-Seventhly, district groups were regulated. Relocations of teachers due to excuse and other reasons were regulated and the issue of taking into account special conditions such as family unity, health, life safety and disability was preserved. The relocations within the province due to excuse were organized to be between district groups. With this regulation, teachers will be able to request to be relocated to a district in a different district group, not within the same district, even if they have an excuse.
-Eighthly, by abolishing the base salary practice, the way was paved for the precarious employment of private school teachers with salaries at the level of minimum wage, and in this regard, teachers were abandoned to the ruthless wheels of the market. The struggle of the Teachers' Union in recent years has clearly shown that rights in the private sector can only be achieved through struggle.
-Ninthly, we can talk about an education administration that tries to close the norm staff shortage of hundreds of thousands of teachers not by appointing permanent teachers, but by employing paid teachers and, in the simplest terms, usurping children's right to education. In the years when higher education was not widespread and the need for teachers could not be met with graduated teachers, the Ministry of National Education took various measures and allowed retired teachers and various professional groups to work as paid teachers in return for additional course fees in order to prevent students from being left without teachers.
This arrangement, known as paid teaching in the public opinion, is stipulated in Article 9 of the “Decree on the Teaching and Supplementary Teaching Hours of the Managers and Teachers of the Ministry of National Education”. According to this article, if the number of teachers is insufficient, additional teaching duties may be assigned up to 30 hours per week in pre-school, primary, secondary, special education and non-formal education institutions and temporary education centers where foreign nationals receive education, provided that they have higher education. As seen in the decision, the assignment of teachers for additional teaching is subject to two conditions. The first is that the number of teachers is insufficient; the second is that they have higher education. Today, it is absurd to talk about the insufficient number of teachers! Therefore, the assignment of teachers in return for additional lessons is one of the most important practices that put the teaching profession in crisis and should be abolished without delay.
In conclusion, when we look at the causes of the teaching crisis in Turkey, we will see that almost all of them are the shortsightedness of the Ministry of National Education, its lack of planning, its failure to grasp the international status of the teaching profession, its failure to prioritize the right to education and the best interests of students, and its aim to train the standard teacher type desired by the ruling bloc, rather than the social function of the teaching profession.
In this context, it is obvious that the solution to the teaching crisis will not lie with those who put the teaching profession in crisis.