In a decisive move to restructure the education labor market, informed sources revealed a new government initiative aimed at realigning teaching specializations with local education outputs and field demands, while significantly boosting employment opportunities for Kuwaiti nationals in the coming years.

This step reflects a calculated workforce localization strategy designed to gradually reduce reliance on expatriate teachers.

According to the sources, the Civil Service Bureau has formally requested the Ministry of Education to begin terminating expatriate teachers in eight educational specializations experiencing workforce surplus, including Islamic education, physical education, French language, home economics, art education, kindergarten, psychology, and social studies, with implementation scheduled over five years starting from the end of the 2026–2027 academic year.

The total number of teachers targeted under this plan stands at 3,795, including 3,757 female teachers and 38 male teachers, with terminations to be carried out gradually based on a structured timeline, aiming to completely eliminate the surplus of non-Kuwaiti teachers in these fields by the end of the plan.

Under the approved framework, 766 teachers will be released annually for four consecutive years, followed by 731 teachers in the fifth and final year, ensuring a smooth transition that avoids sudden disruption to the educational process while fully achieving workforce nationalization goals.

Sources confirmed that this strategy is based on comprehensive data analysis from integrated teacher preparation systems, which revealed clear surpluses in several subjects, alongside earlier decisions to halt new nominations from education colleges in these same fields, limiting intake to current students and expected graduates, reflecting a firm policy direction toward balancing supply and demand in Kuwait’s education sector.