HCM City Department of Education and Training is facing its biggest shortage of applicants for teaching positions, especially for primary schools.

Only half of the new primary school teaching positions had been applied for, despite extending the deadline for applications to July 9, Van Cong Sang, head of the department's Personnel Office said.

The city wants 3,000 new teachers including nearly 560 for primary schools in the 2010-2011 school year, the education department head, Huynh Cong Minh, said.

Most of the positions would be in outer districts such as Binh Tan, Binh Chanh, Tan Phu and Tan Binh, he said.

Minh said the new teacher shortage is the worst so far in the city, particularly for primary schools and for teachers of gymnastics, geography and biology at junior high schools.

The Pedagogy University and Sai Gon University only supply 1,000 new teacher graduates a year.

Phan Van Keo, head of the education and training office in Hoc Mon District said the number of applicants this year has barely met the district's need for new teachers.

They have only received 30 applications for teaching positions at all schooling levels but they need at least 38 for primary level alone, Keo said.

In Can Gio district, only a couple had applied for 17 primary school teaching jobs.

A district education official said they might have to take teachers out of secondary schools to teach primary kids.

Other possible solutions are encouraging retired teachers to return to work and recruiting teachers from other provinces./.