Teachers’ perspectives on the education system in Albania

Abstract

The problems of Albanian education system are very broad and need important attention from the policy makers. Despite the efforts that have been noticed to support education, especially regarding aligning the Albanian education to that of the developed countries of the European Union, there are still many shortcomings that prevent high achievements from students as well as from teachers. There is lack or insufficient funding in public schools to meet the needs of an adequate education for children and teachers. Even though many public schools are reconstructed, there are still many schools with no laboratories for conducting experiments in scientific subjects. These subjects are mainly theoretical, making the lesson more difficult for the teachers and very unattractive for the students. This paper examines several problems consisting in teachers’ salaries, support that they receive from the school, how the trainings they received from the state entities contributed to their professional experience, teachers’ motivation as well as their school environment. Methodology: The methodology used in this study is the quantitave research. This research study comprises a questionnaire completed by 100 teachers of elementary and secondary schools working in Tirana. The questionnaire was conducted for the period of time April to May 2024. Out of 100 teachers 92% work in public schools and 8% work in private schools. The purpose of this research is to focus on the problems that teachers encounter nowadays in the Albanian schools. How difficult is for the teachers of elementary school students to support children and what are the methods of support they receive from their schools and how much is invested in their professional career. Objective: The objective of this research is to identify the main problems encountered in the Albanian education system from the teachers’ perspective. The teachers are requested to provide their own opinions based on the necessities they have, infrastructure, utilization of IT equipment during classes, how motivated and evaluated they feel from their superiors, whether they are happy with their salary and if they have received enough trainings and course which help them in their daily job. Conclusion: The questionnaire resulted very positive in providing the teachers’ opinions related to different aspects of the teaching process such as teachers’ salary which is not adequate in comparison to the huge work that they do daily. More importance must be given to relations between teachers and students and teachers and parents and the teachers suggested that the parents must work more with their children and they must give more support to the teachers. The teachers must receive more evaluation and motivation by the school and the school director.