elorn-katedralskolan

Dennis Ostryd (English and Swedish teacher)

He studied five years before being a teacher : two years of English, one year of Swedish language, one year of Swedish literature and one year of teaching. He started teaching in Northkoping, as a supply teacher for one year.

Mr Ostryd works at teaching writing to his students because they understand and they speak «simple English» but he thinks they cannot write properly.

He works a lot and he cannot define how many hours exactly. He said that he loves his subject, so he «works» watching movies, reading books ... and he uses it in his teaching. «I teach English, I like English. I love English culture, literature, movies, language, whatever as long as it's English.»

He has the same holidays as the students, eight weeks : five weeks in summer, one week in autumn, a fortnight in spring (one week in April and one in February too).

The last week before each holiday is composed of lots of tests, so it involves much stress for students and teachers, above all in May which is the month of all national tests. In Sweden they have two terms in opposition to France where we have three terms. For Dennis, the five weeks in summer are too hard because it is too long and difficult to come back after them : «I don't like having five weeks for summer holidays». He prefers to have shorter holidays. He added, he decided to work on holidays and week ends.

He has good relationship with most of his colleagues «when you start, when you are new, you have to be kind, and after years, you become more independent, stronger and self-confident.». Just as with his students there is no problem and a lot communication between them, he encourages them to continue their studies.

He earns 3500 € a month and he pretended that «it's not too much» because he must pay 30% of taxes.

Lena Brynhildsen (Biology teacher)

She studied ten years before being a teacher : four years in university of biology, five years to receive her PhD and one year in order to become a teacher. Her first recruitment as a teacher was in 1997 in Norrköping and she enjoyed it because she had «good colleagues and students.»

She is supposed to work 45 hours a week but she told us «it's not enough time to do what you are supposed to do» so she does extra hours. «Teachers have more and more things to do to prepare their classes» Besides ,«it's difficult to concentrate at school with other teachers» because they are in the same room, they have not their own offices.

Lena has got lots of administration, meetings, for example sometimes she goes to school on Sundays to work. Moreover, she had to plan her practical works at home. The week when she met us, she had worked 53 hours. So, she has long days like ten hours of work.

She compared teachers to students because both of them have homework after their days at school.

Mrs Brynhildsen concludes that she is not satisfied with her working conditions. She wants «more hours at school, it was much better before».

Yet, she gets along well with other teachers because they talk a lot and try to help, to be kind with one another, and spend some time together.

Thanks to her PhD, she earns 4000 € a month and she thinks «teachers should have better salaries.»

Like Dennis Ostryd, she is happy with her job; «I love my job, I love to be a teacher.»

In order to find out information about the working conditions in the Swedish industry, we rode a bus to the Chocolate factory Cloetta, located on the outskirts of Linköping. We interviewed two people : a worker and the human resources manager.

To start with, let us have a look at the figures. The company is composed of four hundred and thirty-seven employees classified in two categories : the blue ones and the white ones. The workers (blue, maybe a reference to the colour of their overalls), make up a group of two hundred and fifty-eight people whereas the officers (white) constitute a hundred and seventy-nine people. Among these employees, two hundred and ten are men and two hundred and twenty-seven are women. Each group has to perform a different task. That is why the blue and the white have different timetables. They all work forty hours a week but whilst the officers can adjust their working time and even finish at 3:30 pm if they want. As for the workers, they have to work according to three shifts : the day shift (from 7:00 am to 3:00 pm), the evening shift (from 3:00 pm to 11:00 pm) and finally the night shift (from 11:00 pm to 7:00 am). This seems to be quite similar to what we have in France.

The gate beyond which white workers have no access

for sanitary reasons

Having said that, the worker we interviewed added that her job was not too hard. The use of robots, made-to-measure earplugs and the allowance to take a break every hour has contributed to enhance the working conditions. Moreover, they have many services on the spot such as massages or gym and hosting facilities in Spain while on holiday. They are allowed to take five weeks off per year too, four of which must be taken during Summer.

From a more financial point of view, the gap between the lowest salary and the highest is smaller than in France, thanks to the action of unions. Actually almost everybody is a union member which depends on the area of work. Each time it is necessary, employees and employers meet and strive to come to an agreement. As a matter of fact, the government plays a minor part in negotiations. Concerning pensioners, they usually retire at the age of sixty-five but prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt is thinking of putting it back to seventy-five, provoking a virulent debate. Furthermore, like in France, retired people as well as workers get some money from the equivalent of our Sécurité sociale named Försäkringskassan, which administers social insurance.

This way, we can see that the Swedish model is not so far from ours. At any rate, Swedes are very generous given that the six of us came back home with a full bag of sweets :

Morgane, Solène, Arthur, Brendan, Corentin, Guillaume

       On Thursday, we went to Stockholm. After three hours driving through the snowy countryside, we arrived at 10:00a.m. in the Swedish capital city. We first pulled in up the cliffs of Södermalm so that we could enjoy a nice view over the archipelago. Then, we got into Gamla Stan, the old town. After a short guided tour, we all had two and a half hours of free time to have a look around on our own. At 2:00p.m., we headed to the Vasamuseet, undoubtedly one of the most famous attractions of the whole city. This museum exhibits a warship, the Vasa, the pearl of the Swedish fleet, which actually sank in the harbour next door in 1628 and was only picked up in 1621 that is 333 years later although some unsuccessful attempts to save her had been carried on before. After having watched a movie about the salvage of the boat, we also had a guided visit of the museum. Afterwards, it was already time to come back home.

Arthur