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TEACHERS

Stressed Swedish teachers often off sick

Swedish teachers have taken out stress-related sick leave more than the labour market average for years, and the discrepancy has become ever bigger - "You always feel like a failure".

Published: 28 April 2014 09:05 CEST
Stressed Swedish teachers often off sick

Five years ago, teachers were already over-represented in sick leave statistics. It was 30 percent more likely that a teacher who works at compulsory school level would take out sick leave citing mental ill health than the average on the Swedish labour market.

A review of Social Security Agency (Försäkringskassan) figures has now revealed that teachers are 50 percent more likely to take time out citing stress-related illness or other psychological health issues. 

Eva, a teacher with twelve years' experience, spoke with Sveriges Radio (SR) about the stress of being a teacher in Sweden.

"It's a job where you like always feel like a failure," she told SR. "You have to be made out of stone to have this job today." 

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TEACHERS

Teacher in Sweden reported to police for ejecting rude pupil

Sweden's teachers union has rushed to defend a teacher reported to the police for physically removing a 15-year-old boy who called his colleague a "whore".

Published: 16 March 2019 17:09 CET
Teacher in Sweden reported to police for ejecting rude pupil
The use of mobile phones was banned in lessons at the school. Photo: Jessica Gow/TT
A boy at a school in Nybro municipality near Kalmar first refused to hand over his mobile phone at the start of the lesson, and then when his teacher admonished him, he called her “hora”, which means “whore” and is highly offensive in Swedish. 
 
Her colleague then threw the boy out of the classroom, after which his parents reported the teacher to the police. 
 
“As a teacher, you need to have the option of admonishing a pupil and giving sanctions when they break the rules,”
Åsa Fahlén, the head of Sweden's teacher's union, told TT.  “It is completely unreasonable that this should be seen as abusive in and of itself.” 
 
The parents' decision to report the teacher to the police has generated heated debate in Sweden since the case was first reported on Tuesday.
 
“In a decent, well-functioning family, it's not OK to call a teacher a whore and then report them to the police,” Lasse Johansson, chairman of the local municipal education department told the local Barometern newspaper. 
 
Jimmy Loord, an MP for the Christian Democrats, told the newspaper that the case marked “a worrying development which underlined the need to make the various roles in schools clearer”. 
 
Fahlén argued that while it was important that teachers behaved appropriately in the schoolroom, they needed to be able to admonish pupils who got out of line. 
 
“There's a risk that we can get to an untenable situation where almost anything can constitute an offence,” she said. “We need to define clearly what an offence is.” 
 
She said that there was an urgent need for the Swedish National Agency for Education to investigate the issue and produce clear guidelines of what behaviour from teachers was appropriate. 
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