World Teachers’ Day: Better working conditions means better learning conditions!
On World Teachers’ Day - October 5th - teachers, students, parents and communities came together to celebrate the achievements of teachers, and to demand Quality Teachers for Quality Education!
This year, the focus was on working conditions. Under the motto 'Better working conditions for teachers mean better learning conditions for learners', Education International identified six main demands on behalf of its teacher organisations:
1) a decent working environment 2) living wages 3) equal pay and equal rights for women 4) initial and ongoing professional development 5) involvement in policy-making 6) collective bargaining to defend and enhance teachers’ rights.
This year was a special year, marking the tenth anniversary of the adoption of the UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Higher Education Teaching Personnel. Please click here for more information.
Teachers around the world marked World Teachers' Day in a variety of different ways. In Saint Lucia, a Teacher Appreciation Day was held. NUT in the UK marked the day by organising a joint event with Amnesty International. ANDE in Costa Rica organised a forum on the working conditions of teachers and quality education. In Lesotho, LAT, in collaboration with the Campaign for Education Forum organised a World Teachers' Day rally. In Burkina Faso, SNESS and other unions organised a press conference on the commodification of education, and a film screening on the role of the teacher. You can read more about the efforts of EI affiliated unions in many other countries on our website.
Individual testimonies were also submitted to EI’s website by teachers, as well as parents and other education stakeholders from Ghana, Colombia, the US and Denmark to mention just a few. They document the inadequate conditions to which many teachers from all over the world are subjected. To view them, please click here.If you have accounts or photos relating to your World Teachers' Day activities, please send them to us so that we can publicise them on our website. Likewise if you have ideas on how to improve our World Teachers' Day 2008 campaign, please contact us at [email protected].
