The academic staff of the Faculty of Medicine at the University of La Laguna (ULL) have been summoned to a “strike of activity” on October 22, due to the shortfall of teachers. The Comisiones Obreras (CCOO) union has characterised the commencement of the academic year as “agonising.”
The CCOO Teaching Federation of the Canary Islands has highlighted “the threat of an imminent closure of medical education due to a deficiency of full-time teaching staff,” emphasising that the new academic year has commenced with a lower number of teachers than the previous one across various subjects, owing to retirements and exits without replacement.
The precarious state of affairs “will deteriorate in the impending years” and there is “a genuine lack of interest from the health institutions of the Government of the Canary Islands, paired with a lack of foresight from the ULL to recruit new teaching and research roles,” the union declares.
CCOO further states that there is also an inadequate provision of associate teaching staff, revealing that of the 100 new roles planned in conjunction with the Canarian Health Service and the ULL, “only 47 were accounted for.”
Moreover, these positions have not yet been advertised publicly and had initially been proposed by the ULL in July 2023; this offer largely pertains to associate lecturers for three hours, which is “insufficient to meet actual demand,” according to CCOO.
According to the union, the administrative procedure for appointing these roles “is exceedingly complex,” and in the most optimistic scenario, they will not be filled until the 2025-2026 academic year.
Until now, this shortfall has been compensated thanks to the involvement of 150 medical specialists “who voluntarily undertake this responsibility, providing practical, theoretical, and simulation classes, without any pay or recompense.”
However, physicians are reluctant to take on a linked professor role because “they work twice as much and earn less than if they were solely practising doctors,” CCOO contends.
“In light of the shortage of teachers and the decline of the current infrastructure, we support any enhancement in the public offering of full-time teaching positions,” the union asserts, demanding an increase in roles that considers not only theoretical education but also the practical clinical training of students.
