The American experience of the 90s program Troops to Teachers to support social protection and employment of military personnel after their return home from the front lines can be adapted in Ukraine, says Deputy Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine Andriy Kononenko.

"We are already facing a shortage of teaching staff or insufficient or low qualifications of those who remain. This issue is especially acute in the de-occupied territories of Kharkiv and Kherson regions. The situation is similar with doctors," he said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine, adding that "mobilization, military actions and forced migration of Ukrainians have led to a shortage of personnel in the labor market."

To fill it, according to Kononenko, "we need to adapt the experience of foreign countries to our realities."

"For example, Great Britain. Back in 1943, experts indicated that after the war the country would be short of about 70,000 teachers. To avoid the problem for men and women discharged from military service, the British government introduced a special emergency training program with its own training colleges and intensive teaching. And as a result, about 17,000 former military personnel became teachers of mathematics, English, geography, history, labor... A similar program called Troops to Teachers has been operating in the United States since 1994. Then 16,000 American servicemen received the specialty of school teacher," the Deputy Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council said.

"I am sure that this experience can be applied to current servicemen and veterans of the Armed Forces of Ukraine," he emphasized.