There is an opinion that teachers’ hours should be extended. This has taken two directions.

First, we have those who believe that it would benefit the student who cannot cover the syllabus efficiently and is under pressure. As a language teacher, I can say that extending school hours does not necessarily guarantee academic success and is too difficult a subject to discuss here. All I can say is that the idea of extending hours is as fallible as that of parents who believe private lessons (extra time) is a guarantee for academic success. Locking up a child in a room to read does not mean s/he is reading or reading properly... In a nutshell, taking the horse to two water sources instead of one does not mean it will drink.

Then we have the parents who are not thinking of the children, but of themselves. They want to turn teachers into part-time (full-time?) babysitters and claim they cannot go to work because school hours are too short. The fallibility of this lies in the fact that there is no 100 per cent synchronization between school/job hours. For example, afternoon jobs can end at 5pm, 7 pm and so on! And what if one works a graveyard shift? Should we suggest a 24/7 school system and parents are given the option to choose the appropriate ‘class shift’? And what are these parents going to do when their children’s holidays and weekends coincide with them being at work? And what about the teachers who are parents, who have family and family members that are ill and need looking after. No one provides teachers with childcare services – we have to solve the problem ourselves and not by changing school hours to suit ourselves but by hiring babysitters, or, as is the general case, having family members care for the children. Not to be callous, but those parents who want their children babysat after 2pm/2:30pm – do like the teachers and don’t push us underwater so you can stay afloat.

So it seems obvious that extending school hours is not going to be some panacea for anyone, and this opinion against teachers’ present hours seems to reflect some bitter envy or lack of reasoning. And don’t talk about other countries having school on weekends, as journalist Stephen Calleja claimed in his article in The Malta Independent on Sunday – I gave him my two-cents’ worth in my letter to the same newspaper (3 October). The school system, as it is, works because, despite the reduction in school hours, the number of students going to university has risen dramatically since I went there in 1977 – and that was a time when school hours were longer. We teachers are under enough pressure as it is, so, please, get off our case and let us do our job!

Joe Falzon

QALA