Trade Unions

Term of office 2024-2028

Members of the Faculty Committee

Chairman:

• Ing. Miriam Vincejová

Members:

• doc. Ing. Peter Demeter, PhD.
• Ing. Adriana Oroszová

What are the goals of the unions??

• Protection of employees' social and labor rights
• Representation of employees' interests
• Care and improvement of the working environment

More in the attached document.

News

Statement by the Education Trade Union on the financing of education

Dear members,,

The Education Trade Union is dissatisfied with the funding of Slovak regional and higher education and disagrees with the proposed state budget for 2025. We would like to point out that, according to this proposal, the salaries of education employees will not be adjusted for the second year in a row, which is contrary to the government's commitment in its program statement: "the government will ensure annual wage growth for teachers and professional staff and improve the remuneration of non-teaching school staff." The consolidation measures will cause an increase in inflation, resulting in a significant decline in the real wages of education employees.

According to the forecast of the Institute for Education Policy, Slovakia will face a shortage of 1,600 to 2,100 teachers in the coming years. The starting salary for a teacher with a second-level university education is only €1,200 gross. The situation is also unsustainable in the long term for non-teaching staff in regional education and at universities. In some regions, there are already critical problems with staffing schools and school facilities. The basic pay scale starts below the minimum wage and is likely to fall further below this level in the coming years. Principals and rectors have to supplement these employees' salaries from funds earmarked for bonuses or personal allowances.

The proposed one-off bonus of €800 in 2025 does not solve these problems and does not guarantee an improvement in living standards or an increase in the attractiveness of individual professions in education. For this reason, the Union Council refused to sign the Higher Level Collective Agreement for 2025 and 2026, thereby failing to guarantee social peace in the field of education.

The financing of education is inconsistent and causes discrimination in the remuneration of different groups of employees. An example is the compensation allowance, which in 2025 will not be available to employees of elementary art schools, school clubs for children, school canteens, school dormitories, language schools, and leisure centers, which will continue to be funded from the local government budget and not directly from the Ministry of Education.

The Education Trade Union has been informing the public about these issues through the media for a long time and is persistently negotiating at all levels. However, none of this has yet brought the desired effect and the fulfillment of our demands. For this reason, the union's council has decided to resort to pressure tactics to force politicians to address the problems in education without delay. We demand:
 

• Increase the salaries of all education employees by at least 10% in 2025.
• Legislatively set the remuneration of teaching and professional staff at secondary schools, university teachers, and scientific and research staff so that their pay scales automatically start at the first pay grade and first pay class at the level of the average wage in the national economy.
• Legislate to set the remuneration of non-teaching staff so that their pay scale automatically starts at the first pay grade and first pay level at the minimum wage.
• Unify the remuneration of all regional and higher education employees into a single remuneration law.
• Unify the financing of all regional education employees directly from the budget of the Ministry of Education (transfer of personnel costs from the original to the transferred competences of local government).
• Accept the union's fundamental comments on curricular reform (allow the content of education in the state education program to be divided into grades).
   

On Wednesday, November 27, 2024, we are therefore announcing a protest called Education in Mourning – Protest in Black as a symbolic expression of grief over the direction of Slovak education. We call on all employees to come to work on this day dressed in black as a sign of discontent and to share photos from the protest on their social networks with the hashtag # skolstvovsmutku–protestvciernom and tag the Education Trade Union (Facebook: Odborový zväz školstva, Instagram: skolski_odborari).

Dear members, please share this information with your colleagues so that as many people as possible can join this symbolic protest. Let's show the whole of Slovakia our dissatisfaction and our determination! Let's force politicians to solve the problems in education! Education and training are an investment in the future of society as a whole and must be seen as a priority!

If the Slovak government does not meet our demands, we are prepared to continue our protest activities, which may lead to a strike. We will inform you of further steps in due course.
 

Best regards,

Pavel Ondek, Chairman of the Association

Documents

• TUKE collective agreement for 2025-2026 - effective date: 30.07.2025
• TUKE collective agreement for 2024 (pdf, 757 kB) – effective date: od 15.05.2024
  • Addendum No. 1 to the Collective Agreement of the Technical University of Košice for 2024