opinion

The qualifications of teachers are just the quality of education and the speed of advance of the country.

The international conference on education held in October 1994 set October 5 as world teachers’ day and decided to mark the day every year according to the unanimous demand and agreement of the participants.

The main purpose of marking the day is to bring home to people the significance and importance of educational work in social development and to enhance the position and role of teachers.

Many countries of the world are taking part in educational competition while drawing up plans for educational development and steadily improving educational work.

However, in some regions and countries, state investment in education is declining and the living conditions of teachers fail to improve due to political crises and economic instability. As a result, the shortage of teachers greatly impedes educational work.

Moreover, teachers are being subjected to violence.

To give priority to teachers in society and enhance their position and role is an important undertaking decisive of the rise and fall of a country.

In the DPRK, the national and social interest in education is constantly rising.

Measures are being taken throughout society to strengthen the ranks of teachers, update the educational system and improve the contents and methods of education and the educational structure in a rational way.

In order to enhance the qualifications and abilities of teachers, who are in direct charge of educational work, the quality of teacher training is raised and the teachers’ in-service training system strengthened while the work for training reserve teachers is pushed ahead in a far-sighted way.

Teachers are respected and treated preferentially and provided with good working and living conditions.

Apartment houses in Ryomyong Street, Mirae Scientists Street and other newly built residential quarters are allocated to teachers on a preferential basis. Meanwhile, houses for teachers are being splendidly built in Pyongyang and regional areas.

Thanks to the social custom of attaching importance to education, teachers are concentrating their energy on the educational work with pride and self-esteem in their job. Among them are the teachers who volunteered to work at branch schools in frontline areas and on islets and schools in mountainous areas, and the couples and families of teachers who have been devoting themselves to education generation after generation.

Great successes will be achieved in education when teachers are held in higher respect throughout society and when they fulfill their responsibility for the state and society.

Kim Chol Jin, staffer of the Ministry of Education