By: Staff Writer
April 11, 2025
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) said in a recent report that Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) needs 3.2 million teachers.
The world faces a deficit of 44 million teachers to achieve universal education by 2030. In Latin America and the Caribbean, the situation is alarming: 3.2 million teachers are needed, most of them to replace those who leave the profession due to excessive workload, low salaries, and lack of recognition.
“We cannot allow the lack of teachers to continue jeopardising the right to education. Urgent measures are needed to attract and motivate the best professionals into the classrooms. UNESCO calls on governments to prioritise the teaching profession with concrete policies that improve working conditions, training, and recognition. The future of education and sustainable development depends on it,” stated Esther Kuisch Laroche, Director of the UNESCO Regional Office in Santiago (Chile).
The report also said: “The proportion of secondary teachers with the minimum required qualifications in Latin America and the Caribbean dropped from 80 per cent in 2012 to 76 per cent in 2022.
“Fewer than half of secondary teachers are trained in six countries, including Antigua and Barbuda (48 per cent), British Virgin Islands (48 per cent), Dominica (47 per cent), Grenada (39 per cent), Monserrat (46 per cent) and Nicaragua (37 per cent), whereas more than 80 per cent meet the minimum required qualifications in 13 other countries, including Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Jamaica where about 100 per cent meet the minimum required qualifications.
“Similar to Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe and Northern America have also seen a decrease from 89 per cent with minimum qualifications in 2017 to 83 per cent in 2022.”
The report also said: “The diminished status of teaching affects its attractiveness to high-attaining candidates. In Latin America, candidates that choose teaching are academically weaker as compared to a pool of higher education students.
“In fact, students with low PISA scores in Latin America and the Caribbean were more likely to report that they wanted to be teachers than their higher achieving peers.”