Five strikes by non-teachers and two by the Civil Service have a greater impact than those by teachers. The reason is simple — absent teachers don’t teach, absent employees don’t open schools.
On seven different days, schools were closed across the country, and this was only in first nine weeks of classes.
According to , to whom parents of students, but also group directors confirmed that more schools are closing this school year, unions report high membership, but when asked about the matter, the Ministry of Education does not provide figures.
The only time we heard from the Minister of Education, Fernando Alexandreon the subject, it was this month, on the 15thwhen it announced that 6% of establishments had been closed that day, following a strike by non-teachers called by the Union of All Education Professionals (STOP).
Even so, as directors from four different schools report on the radio, the Communication of school closures is made on the same day to the Ministry of Education, obligatorily.
“The Ministry of Education should have these numbers because we report this data on a platform dedicated to guardianship”, he says Filinto Limapresident of the National Association of Directors of Groups and Public Schools (ANDAEP).
Jorge Nascimentodirector of the Bartolomeu de Gusmão Group, in Lisbon, also confirms that acClosing is communicated “on the same day” and in “two moments” to the Ministry of Education and the City Council of each city.
In other words, the government has access to information. Why don’t you give it?
The Union points to the closure of just over a hundred schools, but at the time of the strike Fenprof (which is part of STOP) had even announced that 90% of educational establishments had been closed, according to . All that remains is to wait for news from the Ministry to confirm — or deny — the few existing numbers.
One thing is certain: there have been fewer strikes. So far, 9 weeks after classes started, 48 advance notices have been given. At the same time last year that number was almost double — 84 advance notices. So, pWhy do we now feel that schools are closing more?
Why and truth. Even though we don’t have the exact numbers, it’s natural that this is the case. Of the 613 strikes in the Education sector that took place last year, 92% of them were carried out by teachers, and only 8% by non-teaching staff.
This year, the percentage remains much higher for teachers: of the 48 notices, only 5 were for non-teaching staff. It turns out All 5 of these episodes, which seem minute, led to school closures in large numbers.
Filinto Lima explains why strikes by non-teachers cause more embarrassment than strikes by teachers: “It is easier not to open a school for strike reasons when the strike is by operational assistants, or employeesthan when it comes from teachers. Because in schools, for example in the 1st cycle, where there are already few employees, one or two missing, schools are unable to open their doors.”
In the case of teacher strikes, even if the teacher of one or two subjects goes on strike, the school does not close, says Renascença, only if “all the teachers are killed”, points out Manuel Pereirapresident of the National Association of School Directors (ANDE). But when they are missingmore than 50%” of employees and assistantsthere is now “no guarantee for the complete safety of students”.
This school year, all strikes took place on days glued to the weekendswhether Friday, Monday or Thursday before a holiday.
They were called by different unions and all of them resulted in embarrassment in schools across the country: September 20th (STAL), September 27th (SITOPAS), October 4th and 25th (STAL and Common Front), and October 31st (STTS). This month there were two more: November 4th (Common Front) and November 15th (S.TO.P).