education

Court case may delay school year

Recent UP grads are saying that the government’s hiring criteria is unfair.

The first lesson that students may learn about when they return to school in March is litigation.

That's because recent education graduates from the Universidad de Panama (UP) are claiming that the government's hiring procedures are giving an unfair advantage to graduates from the Escuela Normal de Santiago.

According to their lawyer, Anayansi Turner, the UP grads are being discriminated against because the criteria that the government uses to hire teachers puts an emphasis on test scores that unfairly favor teachers from the other school.

The UP teachers have presented their case to the Third Division of the Supreme Court, and are waiting for their day in court so that they can rightfully compete for jobs in the classroom.

The litigation has meant that the Ministerio de Educación (Meduca) has had to delay the publication of its list of appointments for the upcoming school year, which begins March 3. Those lists were supposed to be published this week.

There are about 6,000 pending appointments at schools across the country.

The Frente de Acción Magisterial, an organization that supports educational programs in the country, has asked the court to rule on the case as soon as possible. Coordinator Andrés Rodríguez said that if the case is not resolved quickly, he fears that the school year could be delayed.