The Republika Srpska government is committed to improving the position of education workers and employees in the cultural field, which will increase their salaries from seven to 20 percent from the beginning of next year, for which an additional 20 million KM has been provided in the budget for 2020, said the Minister of Education and culture by Natalija Trivić.
Trivic said the next year’s budget foresees 300,000 KM for planned reform processes and teacher training as part of that process.
Given the importance of pre-school education, Trivić says, the funds for the pre-school pre-school program have also been increased, for which 500,000 KM will be set aside next year.
– In this way, we will make preschool education accessible to preschool children and enable them to prepare adequately before leaving school – Trivić added.
According to her, more funds are also earmarked for the purchase of textbooks, namely KM 3 million.
– This year, the Ministry provided free textbooks for first and second grade elementary school students and winners of republican competitions, and next year we will provide free textbooks for the third and each subsequent child in the family, which is why we support multi-member families – said Trivić.
She stated that the total budget of the Ministry of Education and Culture in the next year, including primary and secondary schools, boarding schools and institutions of special and artistic education, amounts to KM 354.57 million.
Dragan Gnjatić, President of the Union for Education, Science and Culture, says that he will continue cooperation with the Government in order to achieve a fair increase in the pay coefficients for employees in the field of education and culture.
– The minimum salary in education is now around 450 KM, and with the announced increase it should be around 600 KM, while salaries up to 1,000 KM should be increased by ten percent – said Gnjatić.
Beginning this year, teachers and employees with a university degree in education and culture received higher salaries of at least eight percent after 11 years.
It was the first step in the implementation of the Memorandum on Joint Measures, concluded in 2017 between the Government of the RS and the Federation of Trade Unions of the RS, which foresees that in 2022 salaries of education employees will be equalized with those of other budget beneficiaries.
TST
