The Union of Education, Science and Culture of Republika Srpska is demanding a 10 to 12 percent salary increase for all employees in these fields.
The President of the Trade Union, Dragan Gnjatić, stated at the press conference that at today’s meeting of the board of this trade union, two assistants to the Minister of Education and Culture were also present, who were familiar with the demands.
He announced that on Friday the representatives of the Trade Union will begin official negotiations with the Minister of Higher Education and Scientific and Technological Development regarding salary increases in the field of higher education.
“Salaries are low. Whenever someone announces a salary increase, prices go wild. We ask that a quality analysis of salaries in education be done first, and then that decent salaries be determined. A decent salary only means that people can live normally on their income,” explained Gnjatić.
He reminded that the salaries of employed teachers were finally harmonized with their colleagues from the public administration, and that there were still illogicalities that needed to be corrected. One of them, he said, is the salaries of teachers who have completed higher education, but have a lower salary even though they do the same job as their colleagues with higher education.
Biljana Lubarda from the Union of Education, Science and Culture of the RS stated that there is a discrepancy in the incomes of employed NKV workers who have a guaranteed salary of 1,000 and employees with a higher professional education whose income is 1,470 KM.
“That’s a small difference. Also, there is an extremely small difference between the salary groups that concern teachers compared to administrative workers in higher education institutions. The difference in their salaries is only 15 BAM and this represents a problem for the formation of staff at higher education institutions,” said Lubarda.
She hopes that a solution will be reached in negotiations with representatives of the Ministry.
Miloš Kujundžija, a board member of the Union of Education, Science and Culture of the RS, also pointed out the modest material conditions in schools.
“We are galloping after the environment, and especially after Europe when it comes to material conditions,” warned Kujundžija.
