Warum gibt es so einen Mangel an Niederländischlehrern? [in francophone schools]? Sébastien macht sich Sorgen um die Niederländischkenntnisse seiner Tochter.
https://www.rtl.be/actu/vos-temoignages/pourquoi-une-telle-penurie-de-profs-de-neerlandais-sebastien-sinquiete-des/2024-10-13/article/717971
Von Leiegast
8 Comments
In my personal opinion, because Dutch was the most horrible class we had, beyond even Maths or Religion which some people liked. Dutch was universally hated.
Why is it so horrible? Well, few teachers to begin with, so evidently not the best ones. Then the material is… well, my mom listened to the same barely intelligible audio tapes. Nevermind the quality, you can guess the content just didn’t speak to anyone due to how old it was.
I’ve had to deal with complicated tables of nonsense, more gray than black and white over the years of photocopying. I sucked at all that, I couldn’t make any sense of the grammar, of irregular verbs, all that. Now why is it that when I got a book from my Dutch partner, aimed at Dutch children, everything suddenly made sense? It contained mnemotechnics, examples of similarities with English and even French (did I mention that even if the word existed, we couldn’t use words too similar to French?), rules where my teachers said there were no rules, and so on.
Then, you have some people still justifying learning Dutch because we’re in Belgium, and a lot of people ignoring that “because it’ll get you nowhere but Belgium” ; like Dutch and English are exclusive. I’ve also heard claims like “listening to Dutch politics will make you far right”, and similar takes…
Being a teacher isn’t exactly a very attractive job to begin with. To be a teacher for the most hated class seems foolish even. There’s a lot to work on.
Edit: And to add to the article interviewee’s worry about “low level for secondary three pupil”, a lot of people have been complaining the reforms in the recent years are “leveling by the bottom”. In all classes this, not just Dutch.
***The shortage of Dutch teachers is putting many schools in a difficult situation, particularly in Brussels. Sébastien, a father of four, is concerned about his daughter’s future career prospects, as her level of Dutch seems very low for a third year secondary school pupil.***
Sébastien feels that the Dutch lessons his eldest daughter has received over the last three years have been largely inadequate. He complained via the orange Alert us button that the Institut Maris Stella in Laeken was struggling to provide the planned Dutch lessons due to a lack of staff. This has left his daughter, currently in third year secondary school, ‘without the slightest grounding’ in the language, he says. A situation that reflects a much wider problem: the shortage of Dutch teachers.
‘Her marks were quite good. I thought she was doing well, but in fact I realised that she had very little knowledge of Dutch’, says Sébastien. This father of 4 found the explanation for these shortcomings when he realised that his daughter had many ‘free hours’ between lessons, due to the absence of a Dutch teacher. ‘In a country where two main languages coexist, how is it possible for this to happen, when mastering languages is important for finding a job?’
**A shortage affecting all schools in Brussels**
Imane Kenfaoui, Director of the Institut Maris Stella, points out that the shortage of Dutch teachers extends far beyond her school. ‘This is not an issue for Maris Stella, but for all the schools in Brussels’, she points out.
In fact, the geographical location of a school like Maris Stella does not work in its favour: ‘When you’re away from the city centre in the north-west of Brussels, it’s a bit complicated,’ says the headmistress. ‘Teachers with a degree in Dutch can choose where they work. In other words, they don’t have to travel 100 kilometres round trip to find a job,’ explains Arnaud Michel, Director of the SeGEC’s Communications Department.
**Salary scale, recognition of seniority: the Flemish education system is more attractive than the francophone one**
The shortage of qualified teachers in Brussels is exacerbated by structural factors. Competition between the francophone and Flemish education systems plays a major role in the difficulty of recruiting Dutch teachers. ‘The Flemish education system, which is itself experiencing a shortage, has for several years been putting in place measures which, at least in Brussels, are beginning to bear fruit’, explains a representative of the Union des Parents des écoles d’Immersion en Néerlandais (UPIN).
‘From a salary point of view, it’s more attractive for Dutch speakers to work in Dutch-speaking schools’, observes Imane Kenfaoui. ‘We’re talking about a difference of between €100 and €200 depending on seniority,’ says UPIN.
What’s more, in Flanders, recognition of seniority is more advantageous for teachers from the private sector, which encourages them to prefer the Flemish system. ‘If you come from the private sector and start teaching on the Flemish side, seniority recognition is currently ten years and should be extended to fifteen years by 2025’, explains UPIN.
On the French-speaking side, there is currently no recognition of seniority. If you decide to go into teaching after a long period of experience in the private sector, ‘you end up with a beginner’s scale’, the UPIN adds.
Maybe because English is more useful so we all pick that as a second language in school and almost all the native Dutch speakers live in Flanders.
EDIT: stop with the damn downvoting. I am not saying this is the way it should be, just this is the reason why we can’t find Dutch teachers in Wallonia.
Probably because teachers get better paid in Flanders. Why would Flemish teachers commute further to a Wallonian school for less money than going to a Flemish school nearby?
Social media is destroying language worldwide as well.
I am seriously scared of discussing with newer generations (including mine) because of the absolute low reading comprehension skills. (And boomers also have bad reading comprehension because of lead poisoning)
I worked as a Dutch teacher last year. I’m Flemish and studied languages at the University in Leuven.
It was a fun experience, but the salaries in Flemish schools are higher, so I decided to leave the French-speaking school system, and now im working as a Dutch teacher in a Flemish school. My salary is +300€ net compared to last year, so yeah… It wasn’t a difficult choice for me to switch schools
…
I don’t understand why my French-speaking colleagues make less money than Flemish teachers. It should be the same…
As a native bilingual, I sometimes have to correct our stepson’s Dutch homework. The nonsense that his Dutch teacher tells him sometimes is just painful. Like “in Dutch you never pronounce the last N of a verb”. Hang on…. I’ve been Dutching incorrectly all my life? It’s clear that this lady only learned Dutch from a book, and did her only internship in a remote village in Limburg or something
And then those exercises that stem from last century: describe the life of your “penvriend”. Very useful, knowing a word that’s never used anymore
If you have to teach a language that these people find ‘barbaric’ (their own words) I don’t think it motivates a lot. Besides that, the level of Dutch French speakers get is laughable.