Schools with greater poverty face difficulties with lack of teachers

A most public schools manage to counter the impact of poverty on school failure, but the establishments where the socio-economic context penalizes students are also the ones that suffer most from the lack of teachers.

During compulsory schooling, and especially until high school, few students remain behind, but completing each cycle without failing remains more difficult for the poorest.

Many schools are already able to counter this relationship, but in others the performance of the needy students falls far short of expectations, and the difficulties do not seem to be alienated from the problem of lack of teachers.

The conclusion results from Lusa's analysis of the equity indicator that accompanies students with ASE and compares their school success with the national average of students with a profile similar to the entry of each cycle of studies.

In the school year 2023/2024, which refers to the latest data provided by the Ministry of Education, Science and Innovation, the percentage of students with ASE completing each cycle in the expected time exceeded the comparable national average in about 53% of schools, while 40% had negative levels of equity.

Looking at the map, it is possible to see that the schools that stand out for the positive stand out, especially in the north of the country.

In secondary education, for example, 159 of the 314 schools analyzed managed to have their students in need exceed expectations, but among the 30 with higher levels of equity, 22 belong to districts in the North.

On the contrary, of the 30 schools that occupy the bottom of the table – where the percentage of students to complete secondary in three years is lower than the buyable national average – 15 are in the Lisbon district and five in the Setúbal district, the most affected by the lack of teachers.

This is the case of Alves Redol High School in Vila Franca de Xira. Of the 16 students with ASE, only three (19%) completed high school without failing, well below the average of schools with an identical socioeconomic context (70%).

In recent academic years, the pedagogical area framework (QZP) in which Alves Redol belongs has been classified by the Ministry of Education as “deprived” because there is a structural insufficiency of teachers, but the example of that school in Vila Franca de Xira is not the only one.

In addition to this, another 23 out of 30 schools with lower levels of equity in secondary education are also part of poor QZP, in contrast to those that stand out for the positive, none of which have insufficient teachers.

The relationship between the lack of teachers and the ability of schools to overcome the impact of socio-economic conditions on the success of students is more evident in secondary education, but also in the remaining cycles of education, where half of the 30 schools with lower levels of equity belong to poor QZP.

By regions, the country is clearly divided in half with regard to equity: regardless of the educational cycle, only the North and Center regions have positive values, while the Greater Lisbon, Setúbal Peninsula and Algarve have on average negative values from the first to the secondary cycle.

In addition to children and young people from more disadvantaged families, it is also more difficult for students of foreign nationality to have a free school course.

Among the smaller ones, the differences are less pronounced, but the gap increases as students progress in their studies.

In the 3rd cycle, for example, 89% of Portuguese students finished the 9th year without failing in that or the previous two years, in contrast to the 63% from Guinea-Bissau, or the 61% from Cape Verde and São Tomé and Príncipe.

Throughout all compulsory schooling, Chinese students are the ones who are able to get closer to Portuguese colleagues, the distance being greater in secondary education, where 10 percentage points separate the two nationalities.