About 60,000 public school teachers gathered on the streets of Colombia’s capital, Bogota, on June 6 demanding a government response to a crisis in the sector.
The teachers have been on strike for over a month now demanding reform in education that would see dramatic investment in the sector in terms of pay and medical care as well as a reduction in the student-teacher ratio and improvement in school meals, among others.
Colombia’s national teachers’ strike marked three weeks on June 1 as tens of thousands of education workers continue to pressure the government to respond to their demands for better working conditions, higher salaries and more investment in public education.
In the latest mass protest, about 300,000 teachers took to the streets on May 31 to call attention to education issues in major cities across the country, including Bogota, Cali, Medellin, Bucaramanga and Barranquilla.
On May 17, I received an email from Centrelink advising that I would no longer be eligible for the student start-up scholarship.
This means the $1035 payment that helped to pay for my textbooks, university car parking fees and other course materials will now only be available as a loan I will have to pay back on HECs.
Losing this start-up scholarship will hurt many students, with welfare payments hardly keeping up with the ever-increasing cost of living and rent.
Fifty years ago most people, including politicians, championed the idea of equal educational opportunities for all. The politicians may have only done so for their own political advantage, but even this indicates the strength of the notion.
The latest Essential poll released on May 9 shows voters disapprove of cuts to universities and higher student fees and fear the impact on young people.
It also showed Labor comfortably ahead of the Coalition on the two-party preferred vote by 54% to 46%.
The poll showed 56% disapprove of the government’s reduction in funding for higher education by $2.8bn and 60% disapprove of increasing student fees.
The federal Minister for Education and Training Simon Birmingham will release a report on May 8 commissioned by the government that will allegedly indicate that universities receive adequate funding for most courses and that their revenues are growing faster than their costs.
This report will be used to justify a proposed $2.8 billion funding cut that will raise the costs of course fees and mean that students will need to repay their HECS debts sooner.
Members of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) and students held a protest outside Sydney University's Student Centre on May 3.
The demonstration was held in the context of the current round of enterprise bargaining (EB), in which union members are campaigning for improved job security and better conditions for permanent and casual staff. Perhaps nowhere in the university are these issues more serious than in the Student Centre.
Federal Minister for Education and Training Simon Birmingham has outraged students with his announcement of cuts affecting higher education that will come in the federal budget on May 9. Speculation is rife about the impact the cuts could have on students.
The cuts revolve around a 7.5% increase in university fees. But the reality of the fee hike could be much worse.
In conjunction with the budget’s $2.8 billion in cuts to university funding, universities could be forced to raise student fees by a minimum of 25%.
Women took to the streeks of Caracas on April 27, demanding an end to violent opposition protests, Venezuelanalysis.com said that day. The rally was supported by dozens of women’s groups from across the country, after being called by the Minister of Women and Gender Equality, Blanca Eekhout.
“Sisters, let's go together to fill the streets with love in the defence of life,” Eekhout said ahead of the march. She added, “We will overcome!”
Over the past seven years of Hungary’s right-wing Viktor Orban regime, there were no strong protest waves — until now.
Every day, groups are popping up across Budapest demanding Orban resign. Every two-to-three days, masses gather to protest against new undemocratic laws proposed by the ruling Fidesz party in parliament.
The two biggest protests happened within just one week. The first major protest took place on April 9. It started as a protest against the so-called Lex CEU law that attacks academic freedom and ended with the masses marching on the Fidesz head office.
For the first time since France’s fifth republic was established in 1958, the presidential run-off to be held on May 7 won’t involve a candidate from either the traditional centre-left or centre-right parties.
Former investment banker and ex-government minister Emmanuel Macron (24%) and far right National Front (FN) leader Marine Le Pen (21.3%) topped the results in the first round of France’s presidential elections on April 23.
Four years ago this month, a former bus driver with humble working-class origins became the president of Venezuela.
Promising to continue the revolutionary legacy of deceased former president Hugo Chavez, Nicolas Maduro pledged to advance the living standards of Venezuela’s poor and oppressed.
But since taking office in 2013, Maduro and the Bolivarian Revolution his government leads have faced non-stop attacks from Venezuela’s US-backed right-wing opposition, making advancements difficult.