Primary teachers in Portugal strike, shutting over 100 schools over unequal workload

Walkout closes schools nationwide

A national strike by preschool and first-cycle teachers closed or disrupted at least 138 schools across 62 municipalities on Monday, with the heaviest impact reported along the coast, from Lisbon north to Figueira da Foz. The “Greve ao Minuto” live tracking platform, run by the teacher-led metaPROF initiative, began the morning with eight reports and grew to over 300 by 10:30. The unions involved — Fenprof, STOP, SPLIU and SINAPE — described the action as a response to years of unequal treatment. Meanwhile, a public gathering of more than 100 educators blocked the street in front of the Ministry of Education in Lisbon, with drums, whistles and banners reading “Equal work, equal rights.”

Core demands: hours, calendar, retirement

The central complaint is that the Estatuto da Carreira Docente imposes heavier workloads on teachers who practice “monodocência” — the model in which one generalist teacher delivers all subjects to a single class. First-cycle teachers currently have a larger teaching load than their secondary-school peers and receive a smaller reduction in contact hours once they turn 60: five hours less per week, while teachers from the second cycle upward get eight. The strikers demand a maximum of 22 teaching periods per week, the same as in other cycles, along with the creation of a single school calendar for all grades.

The calendar gap is stark. Pupils in the 9th, 11th and 12th grades finished classes on 5 June, and those in years 5 through 8 and 10 on 13 June. But preschool and primary classes continue until 30 June, adding 15 extra working days for those educators every year. The unions argue this arrangement not only fatigues teachers but also shortens the summer break for the youngest pupils.

On retirement, the movement wants the possibility to retire at 60 or, alternatively, after 36 years of service, without penalty reductions.

Teacher voices

What we want is for equal work to mean equal rights — for everyone, regardless of the level or cycle in which they teach.

We get a five-hour reduction at 60. Our colleagues from the second cycle upwards get eight. That’s one of the injustices we’re here to fix.

Cristina Assunção, a third-grade teacher with nearly 30 years of experience, said chronic understaffing is the daily reality: “We have few people working with us and really need more teachers.” Kindergarten teacher Liliana Maduro also stressed the lack of resources and the need to fight “for equality in the teaching career.”

Union strategy and political context

The strike and public tribunal were timed to coincide with the ongoing revision of the Estatuto da Carreira Docente. José Feliciano Costa, Fenprof’s secretary-general, argued that the staggered calendar makes no sense and linked today’s action to the longer-running campaign for career valorisation. Daniel Martins of the STOP union added that special-education units remain understaffed and called for more education professionals to be integrated. At the end of the gathering, a motion demanding equal treatment across all teaching levels was to be voted and delivered to the education ministry.

Calendar disparity

The different end-of-year dates for each school segment illustrate the imbalance that teachers want to eliminate.