One in eight secondary school teachers unqualified: report

About one in eight secondary school lessons in the Netherlands are given by teachers who do not have the necessary qualifications, according to RTL Nieuws after studying figures from the Ministry of Education. According to the figures, 88.2 percent of secondary school lessons are given by teachers with all the right papers. The rest are not. 6.2 percent of the lessons involve teachers who don't have the right qualifications, but were given an exception. According to the broadcaster, this happens when the teachers themselves are still studying. The other 5.6 percent involves teachers with no diploma and no exception. Education State Secretary Sander Dekker aims to have all secondary school lessons given by qualified teachers next year. "These figures are good news - but we are not there yet", he said to RTL in response to the figures. "We want the best trained teachers in the classroom."