KUWAIT: A number of senior Ministry of Education (MoE) officials met yesterday to discuss adopting new procedures for recruiting expat teachers from outside Kuwait that would avoid previous shortcomings including accrediting the new teachers' degrees. Official sources said the new certificate accreditation law had been impeding the new teachers' appointment procedures and registering them with the Civil Service Commission (CSC).

"The CSC has been refusing to pay the new teachers' salaries unless they get their certificates accredited, which made MoE pay them monthly loans to be deducted when they officially start getting their salaries," the sources explained, pointing out that some of the new teachers do not have the certificates to accredit them with the ministry of higher education on grounds that they had already submitted them on applying, while others would need to travel back to their countries to procure them.

The sources added that the new mechanism involves having a delegation from the ministry of higher education accompanying MoE delegations dispatched to recruit the new teachers so that they can accredit applicants' certificates on the spot through Kuwaiti embassies in relevant countries.

By A Saleh