A-Infos (en) Australia, Melbourne, MACG, THE ANVIL #13-3: Our schools are in crisis (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

School working conditions are students' learning conditions. Educators - 
both teachers and education support staff - are at a breaking point. The 
system is hurtling towards leaving a generation of working class 
children in a significantly worse position than their parents. Educators 
must take control of fixing this problem from the bottom up. ---- 
Putting aside the grotesque industry of private education, even our 
public education system reflects the worst aspects of class society. 
Wealthy, inner-city schools have the resources, facilities, and 
professional support to attract and maintain experienced education 
staff. At the same time, working class suburbs are left under-funded, 
under-supported and are forced to spend more of their meagre budget 
trying to incentivise teachers to take ever-increasingly demanding roles.

The last state-wide agreement prioritised 'workload' reductions over 
pay. However, the Government failed to hire the necessary staff - 
leaving hard-to-staff schools operating with a staff capacity as low as 
60% in some cases. The perverse outcome of prioritising workload 
reductions over pay has resulted in fully staffed (because traditionally 
easier-to-staff) government schools being able to implement a key 
improvement in conditions with relative ease. However, this has come at 
the expense of hard-to-staff schools and their educators, who have been 
left drowning in excessive and unsafe workloads.

The path forward is clear. A radical change to education working 
conditions is required. This cannot be achieved by another government 
inquiry - it must come from those of us at the coal face. Educators are 
experienced professionals. We know how to educate the next generation 
but we need additional support and a major reduction in unnecessary 
meetings and Department driven paper-pushing activities.

To achieve the power required to truly transform our working conditions 
and thus the learning conditions of students at our schools, we need a 
strong union.

While the Australian Education Union (AEU) Victoria Branch has been 
bleeding members, the foundations of a fighting union with 40,000+ 
members is still there. We must rebuild rank-and-file militancy within 
the AEU. This must be driven from below - starting at the sub-branches 
at each-and-every school. Increased density, increased militancy, and 
increased organisation will form the basis of a fighting working class 
movement of educations.

For a revolutionary working class movement to succeed we need a broad 
base of the working class engaged in their unions. If you're an educator 
and want to build a fighting union contact us.

DARE TO STRUGGLE

DARE TO WIN

https://melbacg.au/our-schools-are-in-crisis/
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