Chaos Rules In MoE Corridors As Staff Gear Up For Holidays

As the academic year comes to a close, administrative departments across Kuwait’s educational districts are under immense pressure. Teachers are rushing to finalize leave requests, assignments, and fingerprint attendance updates ahead of the summer break, resulting in unprecedented congestion in employee affairs offices.

System Delays and Lack of Guidance

Sources report that a lack of clear procedures for handling fingerprint-related issues is a major concern. Many staff are unaware of how to process forms for missed scans, absences, or early departures, even though these forms exist within the Ministry of Education's systems.

Compounding the problem is the assignment of inexperienced personnel to administrative roles, absence of proper training, and frequent system failures, all of which are slowing down essential processes.

Teachers Demand System Reforms

Teachers are frustrated that their work is being misrepresented by the rigid fingerprint attendance system. “I was teaching in class and marked late — am I supposed to abandon students to scan my fingerprint?” one teacher asked. There are growing calls to separate the fingerprint system used by the ministry from that of the Civil Service Commission, as it fails to reflect the nature of teaching duties.

Evaluation Concerns and Future Outlook

Sources expect a spike in complaints regarding this year’s job evaluations, which many teachers feel are unfairly influenced by flawed attendance data. They demand that evaluations focus more on classroom performance than biometric records. There’s also a push to activate retroactive data entry tools to avoid penalizing teachers for administrative mistakes beyond their control.

Experts stress that stabilizing school administration requires urgent reforms — upgrading administrative competence and overhauling both fingerprint and evaluation systems — to safeguard the rights and integrity of educators.