This Government is committed to ensuring that every child has a positive school experience, with access to qualified and engaged teachers who are dedicated to supporting their learning.
There are more qualified teachers than ever working in Ireland. As of November 2025, there are over 75,000 teachers employed in Irish schools, including 34,600 at post-primary level, 39,300 at primary level and 1,870 in special schools. This analysis found that just 0.7% of allocations (247 posts) in post-primary and 2.5% of allocations (996 posts) in primary were unutilised. Few teachers resign, with less than 3% of the teaching workforce resigning or retiring annually from contracted teaching posts.
While the Department does not have the data for the number of unfilled post-primary teaching posts in 2025, by subject, data published by the Department for the vacancies by subject for the 2023/2024 school year is available through the Survey of Teacher Unmet Demand in Post Primary Schools 2023/24 report, at this link <https://assets.gov.ie/static/documents/f30264cc/Survey_of_Unmet_Demand_School_year_2023_24.pdf> Amongst other findings, it was reported that there were 52.77 vacant teacher posts in maths in 2023/24 school year. It should be noted that there were over 30,000 post-primary teachers employed during that school year.
A number of measures have been implemented to support the availability of maths teachers. Budget 2025 introduced a €2,000 annual bursary for student teachers in STEM fields, including maths, chemistry, physics, biology, computer science and engineering. during the final two years of their undergraduate teacher education. Beneficiaries will be required to complete at least two years of post-qualification teaching in a recognised post-primary school. In January 2026, the Department issued Circular No. 0019/2026 Concurrent Initial Teacher Education Bursary Scheme (STEM Bursary) setting out the eligibility criteria and application process for this scheme. The aim of the scheme is to encourage more students to train as STEM teachers to help increase the number available to post-primary schools.
In addition, upskilling programmes for teachers have been increased in high-demand subjects such as Irish, French, politics & society, and computer science, maths, physics, and Spanish. These flexible programmes, free to registered teachers, boost teachers’ employment opportunities while addressing subject-specific teacher shortages; 482 students have completed upskilling programmes in Maths.
The Government has implemented several measures to address teacher supply issues more generally that have led to:
- an increase of 20% in initial teacher education graduates (student teachers) between 2018 and 2023, and
- an over 30% increase in the number of teachers registered with the Teaching Council since 2017.
In 2025, a measure was announced to enable teachers gain permanent roles more quickly; teachers taking up their first contract in a viable post will be eligible for a permanent position after one year, subject to successful re-appointment through a competitive process.
Recently regulations were approved to allowteachers who qualified overseasto undertake theirinduction in the State and incremental credit is also available to teachers returning from abroad, depending on the teaching experience gained.
A comprehensive workforce plan for the education sector, a commitment under the Programme for Government, is in development. Additionally,aproject focused on strategic workforce planning for teachers in Ireland, led by UNESCO and supported by the EU Commission, is developing recommendations for addressing the main factors affecting teacher supply in Ireland. The recommendations put forward in the context of the project will form the basis for the development by my Department of a strategic workforce plan for the teaching workforce in Ireland.
My Department has recently published revised arrangements for the award of a Contract of Indefinite Duration (CID) to teachers, which fulfilled a promise made by my predecessor last year. The revised criteria allow for teaches to gain a permanent contract through the award of a CID after one year where they have completed a year of continuous service, where the school has a viable post available, and where the teacher has been re-appointed by the school following a competitive recruitment process. The ability to access a CID a year earlier will help teachers to place their careers on a more stable footing much sooner than before, providing teachers with the certainty that they need, particularly when applying for mortgages.
The revised arrangements for the award of a CID have been introduced following extensive engagement with the Education Partners and it is not currently intended to make any further amendments to the eligibility criteria for the award of a CID.
