DUSHANBE, January 9, 2012, Asia-Plus  -- Although the problem of an acute shortage of teachers has practically been tackled in the country, the quality of education in high schools still leaves much to be desired, the Minister of Education Abdujabbor Rahmonov announced at a news conference in Dushanbe on January 9.

According to him, to provide schools in the provinces with sufficient teachers, they have sent the best fifth-year students at the teachers’ training institutes to the provinces to work with local schools.

Tajikistan now has only thirty-four teaching vacancies, Rahmonov said, noting that 913 teachers working with high schools in the country have secondary education.

“The Ministry of Education is taking measures to provide schools with enough number of teachers and improve the quality of education,” said the minister.  “We plan to organize refresher courses for teachers in the provinces that will contribute to improvement of the quality of teaching.”

Rahmonov also noted that they constructed and renovated 211 schools last year and construction and renovation of forty-four educational facilities with a total of 6,500 seats is under way.  37 new educational facilities will be constructed and seven educational facilities will be renovated, the minister said.