The teaching profession plays a crucial role building a bright future and raising the younger generation. However, this profession is currently facing significant challenges. The image of the teacher, created in the society, substantially contributes to the perception of this profession, leading to the increasing lack of teachers and their demotivation. Research signifies that the image of the teacher communicated in news media is negative, this way deteriorating the prestige of this profession. In an attempt to solve this problem, in 2017 Lithuania set a goal to make teacher’s profession prestigious by 2025 by applying national policy measures. This objective seeks to raise awareness in the society and bring this profession back to its deserved respectful position. One of the ways to do this is communication about teachers as it can significantly improve or deteriorate teacher’s professional image. That is why the problem of this work arises from the question: what is the image of the teacher communicated in Lithuanian news portals facing the upcoming 2025? Is it evident from the news media discourse about teachers that this profession is prestigious and the goal has been attained?
The object of this work is the communication about the teachers in Lithuanian news portals. The aim of this research is to analyse the image of the teacher communicated in Lithuanian news portals in relation to the national policy goal of making teacher’s profession prestigious by 2025. The methodology of the research is of mixed approach. Firstly, critical literature review has been conducted. Then applying purposeful sampling based on criteria the text database has been prepared for quantitative content analysis (N=1598). For the second part of the research, mixed sampling methods were used to filter the database of texts and prepared for qualitative research: critical discourse analysis (N=78). The results of this research show that teacher’s profession is perceived as unattractive due to excessive workload and inappropriate salary. News media communication tends to frame educational issues as crisis, thus creating a negative image of the teacher. In Lithuanian news portals under the analysed period of time the dominant topic was the teachers’ strike, together with the discussion of education issues, but not their solutions. The image of the teacher, communicated in the news portals, is dual: on one hand teachers are shown as role models, who try to take initiative and act in the face of challenges, on the other hand they are portrayed as victims with no hope left. The prestige of teacher’s profession, regarding the upcoming 2025, is communicated as being low. The insights of this research lead to the statement that the national goal to make this profession prestigious by 2025 has not been achieved yet.

Keywords: Image of the teacher, communication in news portals, content analysis, critical discourse analysis, teacher‘s profession.