«This is not a job, but a mission»: Latvian teacher complains about salary received for teaching Russian children 0 25

Kaspars Spunde, a member of the capital's municipality (National Alliance), decided to take on a side job as a school teacher this academic year - fortunately, he has a degree in history. He went to teach children from a former Russian school in his hometown of Čiekurkalns.

In recent weeks, the politician has generously shared his impressions with the media about working in such a school, where many students, as it turned out, do not have a good command of or almost do not speak the state language. This has caused him deep disappointment.

Recently, he also experienced shock upon receiving his salary for the half of September, starting from the 18th, that he managed to work at the school. Here is what Mr. Spunde wrote on social media platform X: "Today I received my first salary as a history teacher for half of September — €112.19. This is payment for 2 full school days and 2 preparatory days. Of course, I did not take on this challenge for the salary, but I want to draw attention once again to how undervalued our teachers are.

In fact, this is not a job, but a mission. Moreover, working in a former Russian school, where you need to invest extra time and energy to break through to the consciousness and attention of the students, you simply exhaust yourself the very next day. It is urgent to raise the salaries of all teachers who work in "combat conditions." Otherwise, we can motivate teachers to continue teaching and conducting extra lessons with their salaries! Otherwise, we will continue to lose educators who leave schools due to students' lack of knowledge of the Latvian language. The Čiekurkalns primary school has already lost 3 teachers."

Interestingly, Mr. Spunde shared his thoughts with his colleague from the Riga City Council - Vice Mayor Vilnis Kiršis, although issues of teachers' salaries fall under the competence of the Ministry of Education.