The increase in the teaching norm, part of the measures adopted on the table in the summer of 2025, is still hugely unsatisfying to teachers. The praise of the parliamentarians who announced that, starting in the fall, some of the teachers could request a two-hour reduction caused a riot.
Several parliamentarians announced this week that an amendment was adopted in the Senate Education Committee that will allow teachers with at least 25 years of experience and the teaching degree I to request a two-hour reduction in the teaching norm. Contrary to expectations, the reactions of the teachers were mostly critical, they considered that the politicians, members of the parties that formed the government in the summer of 2025, when the teaching norm increased by 2-4 hours, are actually throwing dust in their eyes.
“Where were you last year, when the norm was increased by four hours for senior teachers, not by two?”, the teachers revolted.
“Victory” has not yet become law
The Senate is the decision-making chamber for the bill that proposes the amendment adopted in the committee. The reduction of the teaching norm by two hours would benefit both teachers with teaching degree I and teaching experience of over 25 years, as well as teachers who have proven educational performance (according to the criteria that will be established through a subsequent methodology of the Ministry of Education).
After the committee’s approval of the Draft Law L219/2026 amending the Pre-University Education Law no. 198/2023, the proposal must also pass the Senate plenary vote, be promulgated by the President of Romania and be subsequently amended in the Official Gazette. Only from that moment will it become law, and those concerned will be able to submit requests to reduce the teaching norm by 2 hours to the school’s Board of Directors.
The teachers are primarily unhappy that the measure has been heralded as a victory, when in fact it does not even mean a return to the situation in the summer of 2025.
Teachers with seniority in education and teaching grade I benefited from this facility even before the measure to increase the teaching norm for all teachers. From the 2025-2026 school year, the teaching norm has increased from 18 to 20 hours for all teachers, excluding senior teachers. relieved of the two hours, to be mentioned in any way, so that, in fact, their norm was increased by 4 hours.
It is also the main reason why teachers are now showing their faces to politicians.
“We really fought”
PSD Senator Dan Cașcaval, vice-president of the Education Committee, said that he won “so that no teacher means “a hole in the budget”“, and this despite the fact that the proposal, voted unanimously in the end, initially encountered resistance to being admitted to the agenda of the meeting. The parliamentarian recounts in lavish detail what happened in the committee, noting that “probably, (ed. – parliamentary colleagues) will make a merit of their vote forced by me, forced by my party colleagues, forced by the other members of the committee. An initiative that they did everything to throw it beyond the practical application deadline”. The parliamentarian conveys at the end that “the merit of approving this normative act belongs ONLY to the PSD group and me (in any order you wish). We fought, effectively”.
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The leader of the Argeș “Muntenia” Pre-University Education Union, Adrian Voica, instead asks the parliamentarian where the teachers’ defenders were at the time of the adoption of the austerity measures that targeted the teachers for the first time.
“Senator, the speech sounds spectacular, but political memory cannot be selective.
When Law 141/2025 was adopted, which brought measures contested by teachers and added pressure on the education system, where was the PSD? Then the “budget hole” no longer exists? Then was there no need for firmness and the defense of teachers?
It is easy to talk about the dignity of teachers today, after years of education being treated in the logic of austerity and political compromise. Teachers do not need heroes of the moment and dramatic speeches in committees. They need consistency, respect and policies taken when the political costs are high, not just when applause is convenient.
Education cannot be defended only by emotional posts and late demarcations. The teachers remember very well who voted, who remained silent and who bypassed measures that affected the Romanian school”, Voica sent.
Reactions on the same note had dozens of teachers from groups on social networks when other parliamentarians – one of them was Monica Anisie, former Minister of Education – announced the adoption of the amendment. Moreover, the teachers also rioted against their colleagues who welcomed the victory announced by the politicians.
“They found something to tear our eyes out, what a big budgetary impact this measure under the project represents! By the time it’s approved, it’s gone. All the laughter”, the teachers commented.
“What a victory, you naive people?!? Have you no shame? What mimicry, what servitude! Can’t you somehow pay them some odes?”, the teachers also revolted against their colleagues.
“The hardest part was finding those hours”
In schools, teachers who might demand, if the bill becomes law, a two-hour reduction have become immune to such good news. Instead, explain what this year meant when they sometimes taught not 2-4 hours more, but, I say, even more. It was very difficult, for example, for teachers in technological high schools, who year after year concentrate teaching hours in a shorter period than in theoretical high schools where students do not have practice hours.
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“Even more difficult than teaching in addition, because some of us were also paid by the hour, therefore we were used to the work, it was for the principals to manage to secure the 2-4 hours necessary to complete the department. There are teachers who for this reason now teach in not two, but three schools, or in each of them the director expects you to carry out other activities, outside of the department. And it is difficult to tell him that you have the basic norm in another school. And you do and there. For many it was not difficult, it was terrible.” a teacher revealed.
As much as the increase in the teaching norm hurts the teachers and the increase in the number of students in the class, adopted in the same package given as an overnight gift to the teachers last summer. The measure is strongly felt in classes where there are also students with special educational needs. It is also felt in schools where, along with this growth, there have been mergers of classes, switching to simultaneous education.
Another problem pointed out by the teachers is that, by increasing the rate, the number of hours available for payment by the hour has decreased. Today, if they still exist, almost no one wants them, because at even 30 lei/hour, which is the amount in force since last fall, they become by far a burden, not a significant salary increase.
Above all, educators and teachers wonder if they will ever be able to benefit from such a measure to reduce the teaching norm by two hours.
