A study op inseryice educ a hon and classroom practices un azerbaijan: into

Social Conditions for Teachers

Perhaps the greatest challenge for education in Azerbaijan is the social conditions under which teachers work. Most earn less than $50 US per month, while a family of four requires at least $170 US per month to survive. Salary payments are often delayed, sometimes for months. Most teachers supplement their meager incomes with tutoring or outside employment, with some earning as much as several hundred

\ Sll in ()| INSI KVK I I -.1)1-CATION AND CLASSROOM l'RACTICLS...
dollars US per month as a result of these augmentations. All teachers earn basically the same salary, with minimal differential for years of experience, additional training, or excellence.

Many teachers must teach without textbooks, or with insufficient
texts for all of their students and for the subject areas they may teach:
there is often insufficient heat in the schools, or no heat at all in many
eases. Many schools are in very poor physical condition, although a
World Bank grant is scheduled to refurbishment of a small

number of pilot schools.

Contributing to the suffering of teachers, especially those who teach refugee children or who may be refugees themselves, is a pervasive fact of life in Azerbaijan, the ongoing occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent Azeri territory. The issue was raised by respondents in virtually every interview and meeting as the study was implemented. The large number of refugees, both children, families, and teachers, constitutes an enormous challenge for an already overburdened economy and educational establishment, not to mention the emotional drain on the populace of such a continuing situation.