(ECNS) -- China's kindergartens, primary and middle schools, as well as medical care industries, where female employees account for a majority, are struggling to cope with personnel shortages, following a national policy that allows all couples to have a second child, the People's Daily reported on Friday.
At the Yanxiang Primary School in Jinan, capital of Shandong Province, there were 29 classes, or 1,593 pupils in total, and 75 of its 90 teachers were women. According to the school's headmaster Li Hong, four teachers were on maternity leave, five others were pregnant, 11 newly-wedded female teachers wanted to start families soon, and another 25 planned to have a second child.
"Most of the female teachers who have given birth to or want to have a second child have rich teaching experience and are the backbone of our school," Li said. "If they take maternity leave on a mass scale, indeed it would have a big influence on the school's operation."
To protect women's reproductive rights, many local governments have rolled out legislation to extend maternity leave.
On May 27, Henan Province passed a rule that grants women who give birth to a first or second child up to 190 days of maternity leave, three months more than the national stipulation of 98 days.
As a result, schools were struggling to maintain normal operations. An executive with a local specialized secondary school said, "About 90 percent of our teachers are female, and when they take maternity leave, plus winter and summer vacations, they don't return to class for more than half a year."
The school has four teachers on maternity leave and three others expecting. "If the school did not intervene, many subjects would have no teachers," said the executive. However, the school had no autonomous right to hire teachers, and the education authority granted it a quota of just three or four new teachers a year at most.
Wang Hui, head of a Jinan-based kindergarten also hoped for more teachers, as the facility was under similar pressure.
On the other hand, some private schools have managed to maintain normal operations by compromising the legal rights of female teachers. Xiaomei, a teacher at a private primary school in Jiaozuo, Henan Province, said she began working at home when her baby was three months old, while her friends working in private businesses only had maternity leave of a little more than one month. "Otherwise, they would be fired after the maternity leave," she said. "Some of my classmates are already past 30 and still dare not start a family."
Wang, a senior human resources female executive, said the key to the problem lay in improved management and innovative work modes, such as having flexibility.
Yanxiang Primary School's Li suggests that education authorities set up a backup teacher database so that schools can apply for them whenever necessary.
