News Briefs
Teachers in France resist job cuts
Apr 10, 2008 3:49 PM
France’s education unions have been mobilizing against President Nicolas Sarkozy’s plan to cut 11,200 teaching jobs at the start of the next school year. The center-right government would also increase teaching hours for those who remain.
In response, secondary teachers went on sporadic strike actions at a number of schools across the country on March 27. Other school districts and student unions across France joined in national actions on April 2, supported by the large Parents of Students in Public Schools Councils Federation.
Patrick Gonthier, General Secretary of the National Union of Autonomous Trade Unions-Education, one of the unions involved in the fight, blasted Sarkozy’s education reforms. “Reduced budgets have, month after month, reflected the withdrawal of the state, the deliberate choice to put education as a public service at risk,” Gonthier said. He noted how every French government in recent years has been guilty of education cuts “and 2008 is the most severe.”
Education International, March 28
