Subject cuts expose cracks in Egypt's under-funded school system

By Nayera Abdallah and Jaidaa Taha

CAIRO/DUBAI (Reuters) - An overhaul of Egypt's high school curriculum has left teachers and pupils scrambling to adjust, laying bare strains on state education provision that many families spend heavily to supplement with private tuition.

The move to reduce the number of subjects that count towards final exams and determine access to university attests to the government's challenge of reducing debt while protecting public services for a surging population under its latest IMF reform programme.

It also reflects the plight of Egypt's struggling middle classes, where millions of students are caught up in the fierce competition for university places and tens of thousands of teachers try to boost meagre pay by offering private classes.

As the school year began in late September, just six weeks after the decision was announced, some teachers had started trying to compensate for lost income by switching to new subjects or finding a job on the side.

Philosophy teacher Mohamed Adel said that although he would continue teaching at his state school in Cairo, he would lose private tutoring income and would search for a second job.

"What's most important is that the government protects me and covers my needs," he said.

Hussein Abo El Enein, a French teacher in a private tutoring centre in Cairo, said some pupils and families were glad that there were fewer required subjects. But the number of students had dropped so sharply that he was forced to lay off 15 assistants.

'CONSTANT FIGHT'

Newly appointed Education Minister Mohamed Abdel Latif has said the changes are aimed at easing the financial burden on parents paying for private tuition across a range of subjects.

But some critics see it as a cost-cutting move. Removing French, German, geology, and philosophy and consolidating other subjects like physics into general science could allow the ministry to reduce the teacher deficit by reassigning existing staff, they say.

"The whole issue is a money and budget issue, and this is our constant fight with the government," Freddy Elbaiady, a member of parliament and vice-president of the Egyptian Democratic Social Party, said in an interview.

"He (the minister) is trying to save on spending. And this is not the solution. Spending is already low ... We need to pay more for education and not reduce content," he added.

The education ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

With more than 106 million citizens, Egypt is the Arab world's most populous country. But the country has struggled with weak economic growth and state services have been eroding. The education ministry has been grappling for years with a lack of teachers and classrooms for about 23 million school-aged pupils.

Teachers complain of being severely underpaid and classes often have to be held in shifts due to lack of space.

Announcing the curriculum changes, Abdel Latif said the ministry had a plan for filling a shortage of 469,860 teachers but called it "a major challenge."

The plan included engaging 50,000 contractor teachers on pay raised to 50 pounds ($1.03) from 20 pounds for each class taught, typically lasting 45-minutes. It ran alongside a presidential initiative to hire 30,000 teachers annually, Abdel Latif said in a televised press conference.

But some observers say this isn't enough.

"Every year a big number of teachers retire... and we have two million students going in the system, so besides the 50,000 we need to hire more teachers," said Mohammed Sayyed, a researcher for the education sector at Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR).

PUPILS' UNCERTAINTY

Final school exams in Egypt involved frenzied competition, taking a toll on some pupil's mental health, according to local media.

The subject cuts have drawn mixed reactions. Some students welcomed them, while others felt they were missing out on interesting study areas that could help improve their grades.

"I was happy at first because there would be fewer subjects so I'd have time to study more important subjects like chemistry and biology," said Salma Nagy, a high school student in Cairo.

"But at the same time, the other subjects used to help increase students' total grades so we do not know if this will make our grades higher or lower," she said.

Egypt's constitution requires state spending on school education at a level of at least 4% of gross domestic product (GDP) with the percentage increasing gradually to align with global standards. UNESCO urges educational funding to reach 4 to 6% of GDP.

Sayyed and Elbaiady said the target had never been met since the constitution was written in 2014, the year Abdel Fattah al-Sisi became president.

While the government says it fulfils the constitutional obligation, Elbaiady said that claim is based on figures that don't account for repeated currency devaluations.

Education spending was 1.92% of GDP in the 2023/24 financial year, slipping to 1.72% in the 2024/25 budget, Elbaiady said.

In comments at a youth conference in Alexandria last year, Sisi appeared to acknowledge the state's difficulties in meeting constitutional targets for education as well as health spending.

"Does the Egyptian state have money for 100 million to give them an education," he said, in reference to the country's total population. "The required numbers are not there, we all have to be realistic," he said.

(Reporting by Jaidaa Taha in Cairo and Nayera Abdallah in Dubai; Editing by Aidan Lewis and Alexandra Hudson)