Minimum salary for teachers in Tallinn to rise to EUR 1,920 on Sept. 1

TALLINN - The Tallinn city government approved a draft decision on Tuesday to raise the minimum monthly salary of qualified teachers and support specialists in schools, kindergartens, and hobby schools by 100 euros starting Sept. 1, bringing it to 1,920 euros.

The change is part of Tallinn's education investment strategy, which aims to support implementation of the teaching career model and encourage teachers to obtain the required qualifications.

"With joint efforts by the city and the state, the minimum salary for qualified teachers in Tallinn should exceed 2,000 euros by January 2026. The city has taken its step, and I now look forward to the state's contribution," Deputy Mayor of Tallinn Aleksei Jašin said.

"The City of Tallinn is listening to teachers and is steadily working to increase salaries and reduce workloads. But there is still a long way to go to achieve a balance between pay and workload. We're happy to say that the city is finally taking responsibility as a school manager and investing its own funds to improve teachers' working conditions. This should help ease the teacher shortage in the context of the transition to Estonian-language education," Jašin added.

Three million euros have been earmarked in this year's budget to fund the salary increase for the final four months of the year. In total, the annual cost of the raise will be approximately 9.39 million euros from the city budget.