(Illustration) The General and Technological High School of Baimbridge, in Pointe-à-Pitre, in Guadeloupe. - Helene Valenzuela / AFP

Locked doors, sticks in locks: many parents find the door closed when they arrive in the morning in front of the school. Since December 5, "90% and 70% of secondary and first degree establishments" are blocked in Guadeloupe due to a teachers' strike, says the union SNES-FSU Guadeloupe.

In addition to the mobilization against the pension reform and the baccalaureate reform, teachers are protesting against the reduction in resources allocated to education and the elimination of 72 positions (53 in secondary and 16 in primary) at the start of the new school year. next, announced last December. They also ask for the classification of Guadeloupe as a priority education zone.

The situation is also tense in Martinique, where the abolition of 73 positions (25 in schools and 48 in secondary) was announced and a motion of no confidence was filed by five unions against the rector of the academy of the department, Pascal Jan.

"How the academy and the government let the situation deteriorate"

"We have been on strike since December 5, but since January, the movement has hardened," said Tuesday at a press conference Eddy Segur, general secretary of the FSU union. "We are mobilizing against pension reform, of course, but also against the forecast of the abolition of 72 positions," say the teachers of Maurice Satineau college, in Baie-Mahault, gathered in front of the grid, every morning, before join the rectorate to join the ranks of the picket line.

Consequently, a large part of the children have not been going to school for several weeks: “The Collège Général de Gaulle [located in the commune] of Le Moule has been on strike since December 4. Since that date, my fourth year child has had classes only four Mondays and two Wednesdays. And still not all the teachers were present. So six times in more than two months, ”regrets Vincent, a parent of a student. "I see my child out of school and seriously worried about his school year," he adds, saying "understand the teachers' movement, but" not how the academy and the government can let a situation deteriorate to this point. ".

The FSU criticizes local education policy. "Mister rector, you meticulously destroy the public education service in an academy which throws out of the school system thousands of students every year without a diploma", lashes out in a letter addressed to the rectorate Eddy Ségur. The trade unionist points to an index of social positioning in Guadeloupe, which "if we were in hexagonal France would lead to the creation of 270 permanent positions".

Demographic decline

The rectorate argues, to justify the job cuts, a demographic decline. "The drop in enrollment at the start of the next school year (-902 students in the first grade) allows to release about sixty positions of which only 16 must be returned to the ministry," wrote the rectorate in a press release.

“The demography means that there are fewer students in Guadeloupe. The abolition of posts is not proportional to the abolition of the number of pupils, it means that the rate of supervision in Guadeloupe next year will be further improved, "said Wednesday the Minister of National Education Jean-Michel Blanquer , responding to Senator Victoire Jasmin (PS). "Today, the rate of supervision in priority education in Guadeloupe is 17.6%," continued the Minister, recalling that "that 65% of schools in Guadeloupe have less than 22 students per class". In 2019, 86 positions had been eliminated in Guadeloupe and 44 in 2018.

📢 I asked the @gouvernementFR during #QAG about the situation of #Education in #Guadeloupe and revelations concerning the supposed mutation of pedophile teachers to #OutreMer.
⬇️https: //t.co/dIyuMUnvyt

- Victoire Jasmin (@SenatriceJasmin) February 5, 2020

A moratorium on education

The parliamentarians of Guadeloupe were then received by Jean-Michel Blanquer. A meeting eagerly awaited by the unions who had met the deputies of Guadeloupe, Olivier Serva, Justine Bénin, Max Mathiasin and Hélène Vainqueur-Christophe, before a meeting between the elected officials and the rector of academy Mostafa Fourar, on January 31. "The challenge is to try to demonstrate the specificities of Guadeloupe," said Olivier Serva (LREM) ensuring that he brought some of the arguments of the unions to the government. He cites in particular a “double illiteracy rate” on the island.

🎯 EDUCATION STRIKE: THE DEPUTIES OF GUADELOUPE ARE COMMON TO DEFEND THE SUPERIOR INTEREST OF THE GUADELOUPÉEN EDUCATION SYSTEM AND OF ALL ITS STAKEHOLDERS. pic.twitter.com/zx5fjqqihX

- Olivier SERVA MP (@olivier_serva) January 31, 2020

The deputies and senators of Guadeloupe asked during this "fruitful" interview with the Minister of Education, Jean-Michel Blanquer, the establishment of a moratorium on the abolition of post in the department. "The minister heard our argument," said Max Magiasin, a Guadeloupe deputy, at La1ère. "Proposals were made by both parties and tomorrow [this Thursday], since things were done in a constructive spirit, the Minister will communicate with us to give us his decision on the issue of the moratorium, on the issue of the parliamentary mission for the evaluation of education in Guadeloupe, with its archipelagic nature ”, he added.

Society

Transfer of pedophile teachers in Overseas France: Ultramarine deputies call for an investigation after the words of Ségolène Royal

Society

Bac reform: What sanctions for teachers and students who disrupted the continuous assessment tests (E3C)?

  • West Indies
  • Jean-Michel Blanquer
  • National Education
  • Education
  • Society
  • Guadeloupe
  • Martinique