This photo is from a demonstration today by teachers, parents, and schoolchildren in Dronten small town in Flevoland province in the Netherlands against the government’s education policy.
The banner says: ‘The Hague [Dutch government city], wake up! Sign the petition at www.pofront.nl‘.
A video of the Dronten demonstration is here.
Today, teachers have been on strike everywhere in the Netherlands. The government does not employ enough teachers, meaning primary school children are in overcrowded classes. So far, the Dutch government refuses to employ more teachers, claiming they are a caretaker government and there is no new government after the elections yet. There is a quarrel between the government coalition political parties on this issue.
Today, there is a big demonstration against government education policy in The Hague.
Elementary school teachers are to strike May 30 in the southern provinces of the Netherlands, as part of a wave of working class struggles that brought the number of strike actions in the small country to 32 in 2017, the highest number since 1989: here.
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Saturday, 17 February 2018
DUTCH TEACHERS ON STRIKE
DUTCH teachers are on strike, demanding decent salaries and a normal workload, and urging the government to clearly and firmly address burn-out and a shortage in teachers in primary education.
The first regional strike of the planned Code Rood (Code Red) sequence was held in the provinces of Groningen, Friesland and Drente, in the Netherlands, on Wednesday, 14 February.
As reported by Education International (EI) affiliate, the Algemene Onderwijsbond (AOb), the current flu season supports the Front for primary education (PO-front) in staging the series of protest actions to reduce workload and increase salaries.
AOb commented: ‘It makes the shortage of teachers extremely visible in the Netherlands.
‘Since the beginning of February, schools report about their struggle to cope with the absence of their colleagues on sick leave. ‘Among other things, there are no teachers available for replacement, classes are sent home, retired teachers are begged to help out, education personnel employed on a part-time basis work extra days, school leaders teach the whole week and not-yet-too-sick continue teaching, even if they shouldn’t.’
Following earlier protest actions in June 2017, October 2017 and December 2017, the Dutch government started to take small steps. The Minister of Education, Arie Slob, decided at short notice to announce the budget publicly which he had planned to release in 2021. The budget is oriented towards measures to reduce the workload. The unions and employer organisations in the PO-front welcomed the decision. They see it as a first meaningful step.
‘Workload can only be reduced effectively when there are enough teachers, and in order to attract more people into the profession, only a substantial salary raise can help. Therefore, the announced series of strikes is to take place as planned,’ AOb added.
Susan Flocken, European Director of EI’s European region, the European Trade Union Committee for Education (ETUCE), welcomed the agreement reached. She stressed: ‘It is high time for education authorities to seriously commit to quality education and improving the status of the teaching profession. ‘In times of demographic change, retaining and attracting highly qualified teachers into the profession is crucial.’
Indeed, the provision of quality education depends on decent salaries and working conditions for the retention of qualified professionals and the recruitment of young qualified teachers, she noted.
She concluded: ‘ETUCE supports AOb in this action and is convinced that this action will lead to meaningful and bigger steps forward for teachers in the Netherlands.’
https://wrp.org.uk/news/14074
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