The urgent needs of educators in schools were not mentioned in the Budget, the Malta Union of Teachers complained today.

"The MUT was expecting that these concerns, which also emerged in recent studies conducted by both the union and the government, would be a priority for the government," the union said.

The concerns included a shortage of personnel to cope with administrative duties.

The union said that while many graduate teachers were ending up unemployed or employed in areas for which they did not study, most teachers in both state and church schools were 'maxed out on loads.'

It said some schools will be in crisis once winter sets in as people fall sick.

The budget , it added, also failed to provide on-call personnel for kindergartens and LSAs. When these kindergarten assistants and learning support assistants were absent, children might have to be sent home.

The MUT welcomed a number of measures announced in the budget including the earlier screening of children so that special needs are identified and support provided at an early stage, the extension of sabbatical leave and the roll-out of the tablets project in 2016. Also, at last, new laptops would be provided to teachers, LSAs and Kindergarten Assistants in the coming months.

The union welcomed plans for the university and Mcast.

However, it said. the budget failed to address an acute overpopulation problem at the Institute of Art and Design, which, it said, is over populated by 400 students.

"This overpopulation is causing huge problems in logistics and organisation, but worse than this legal parameters in laboratories and workshops are not being respected, putting both lecturers and students at risk."  

The Union will be issuing more comments once it has mo