According to public broadcaster SVT, IES (Internationella Engelska Skolan – International English School) claimed millions of kronor in state grants after submitting false information to Skolverket.
Skolverket awarded the grants to IES as part of its Lärarlönelyftet drive to improve the salaries of teachers with particular qualifications, like languages. However, teachers who do not have a valid Swedish teaching qualification are not allowed to teach languages, meaning they are not eligible for the grants if they do so.
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Despite this, the school chain had falsely ticked the “not language teaching” box on the application forms of 90 unqualified teachers at over 30 schools up and down the country, receiving a total of 426 grants over two years – despite the schools’ websites showing that these teachers only teach languages.
IES previously told SVT that they had applied for the grants as a protest against the fact that unqualified language teachers are not eligible, later saying that it had instead been due to teachers “accidentally” being listed in the “wrong” category in the grant applications. There is no “right” category for unqualified language teachers in Skolverket’s application, SVT reports, as this group of teachers do not qualify for the grants.
The chain also claimed that it had sent in supplementary documents to Skolverket explaining that it applied for the grants as a protest, although neither Skolverket nor SVT has received this document.
In an email, IES told SVT that the error was due to “shortcomings in internal management” and that it would pay back the money.
Oh, what a shame!
Poor kids. How could an unqualified teacher grade a student? That opens up a different set of questions now 🙁 !!!