Do teachers back school student action?
Over the last six weeks, thousands of school students have walked out in protest against the running down of the education system.
250 walked out in Neale-Wade Community College in Cambridgeshire over overcrowded school dinner facilities and short lunch times. A school student quoted in the local press said “they [teachers] decided to go on strike for what they want and we thought that if it is all right for them, then it is all right for us to do the same for what we want”.
Over 150 students in Pontllanfraith School in Blackwood, Wales walked out over the possibility of several teachers losing their jobs. This action resulted in management distancing themselves from this suggestion. It looks likely that the teachers’ jobs have been saved, which would mean a victory as a result of the students’ action.
800 protested in St Aelreds Catholic Technology College in St Helens, Merseyside over worries for the future of their education, connected to plans to close the school and replace it with an Academy.
There are other reports of smaller scale walkouts, and also of students angry and beginning to organise around petitions to the head, in schools and in colleges.
Internationally, school students are playing an important role in fighting back. 300,000 French school students marched in May against education cuts. 8,000 school students marched through Berlin in the last fortnight over similar issues. (see anticapitalism.org.uk for fuller reports).
School student strikes have won big victories in the past. In 1985, inspired by the miners strike and in revolt against the Conservative government’s Youth Training Schemes, hundreds of thousands of school students walked out in coordinated action. This led to the YTS being shelved.
School student action may be a sensitive issue for some teachers but ISR want to bring together all those school students who have been involved in walkouts and build a national campaign for better conditions in schools.
Ben Robinson, International Socialist Resistance national organiser
250 walked out in Neale-Wade Community College in Cambridgeshire over overcrowded school dinner facilities and short lunch times. A school student quoted in the local press said “they [teachers] decided to go on strike for what they want and we thought that if it is all right for them, then it is all right for us to do the same for what we want”.
Over 150 students in Pontllanfraith School in Blackwood, Wales walked out over the possibility of several teachers losing their jobs. This action resulted in management distancing themselves from this suggestion. It looks likely that the teachers’ jobs have been saved, which would mean a victory as a result of the students’ action.
800 protested in St Aelreds Catholic Technology College in St Helens, Merseyside over worries for the future of their education, connected to plans to close the school and replace it with an Academy.
There are other reports of smaller scale walkouts, and also of students angry and beginning to organise around petitions to the head, in schools and in colleges.
Internationally, school students are playing an important role in fighting back. 300,000 French school students marched in May against education cuts. 8,000 school students marched through Berlin in the last fortnight over similar issues. (see anticapitalism.org.uk for fuller reports).
School student strikes have won big victories in the past. In 1985, inspired by the miners strike and in revolt against the Conservative government’s Youth Training Schemes, hundreds of thousands of school students walked out in coordinated action. This led to the YTS being shelved.
School student action may be a sensitive issue for some teachers but ISR want to bring together all those school students who have been involved in walkouts and build a national campaign for better conditions in schools.
Ben Robinson, International Socialist Resistance national organiser
posted by classroom teacher at
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