European Trade Union Committee for Education

Today, on 6 February 2018, SNES-FSU, one of the ETUCE member organisations in France, and all its affiliates are on strike.

According to SNES-FSU, the French government is proposing a reform without having taken the time for a serious assessment and in-depth discussions. The proposed reforms risk reinforcing inequalities amongst high schools and students, in particular students coming from low economic and social background. It also has tremendous consequences on the education personnel, such as a drop of 20% of available vacancies and a cut of 2600 of teaching positions at a time when 26000 more students are expected to join the classrooms.

Odile Cordelier, National Secretary to SNES-FSU said “Today education personnel should mobilise and say “no” to this proposal in France”.

As a matter of fact, the education trade union demands to:

• safeguard the baccalaureate, primarily based on final, national and anonymous tests with the review of the nature of the tests, their duration, the coefficients in each series to strengthen the value of the examination;
• safeguard the various branches of high school;
• reshape the baccalaureate and high school systems for the benefits of students;  
• improve the working conditions of education personnel.

Susan Flocken, European Director of ETUCE confirmed that “ETUCE  strongly believes that the provision of free publicly funded quality education is a central responsibility of every government. In solidarity, we wish our colleagues success for their strike action”.