Education International…March 2014 Newsletter

…@eduint (EI), the voice of educators worldwide, brings together 401 education unions. @IIEglobal, more admin-centric, is another resource. See their list of top twitter sources for international higher education. Consider this a call to higher ed casuals from around the world for links and information sources on and especially directly from precarious faculty globally.

Sylvain Marois, ULaval, is working on a report for COCAL XI on the global casualization of academic labor — I'm helping and ask you to join us. Aside from US, Canadian, UK and Australian sources, our collection is still short on less top down sources, e.g. directly from sessional faculty and groups representing their concerns, which are very much the same as ours. We are not alone.

March 2014   News highlights from the global education scene On March 8, the international community celebrated International Women's Day. That is a good moment for us to reflect on the importance of gender issues – which are of such significance for our work. Not only are the majority of teachers organised through Education International's affiliates women – as teachers, we are in the best position to work for equality on a daily basis. See our choice of this month's other news below – don't hesitate to forward this email to your colleagues, using the "Forward" button. Kind regards, Fred van Leeuwen, General Secretary EI RSS News Feed Ukraine: A hotline for students and teachers in the Crimea The Ukrainian education ministry has established a hotline for teachers and students in the Crimea who may find themselves Russian citizens after the referendum on 16 March. "We get a lot of calls from young people who are very worried about their future", a deputy education minister told an Education International delegation visiting Kiev on 13 and 14 March. "We have asked our universities to open their doors for students from the Crimea who want to leave the peninsula to avoid waking up in another country". >>>>> Online consultation for the next GMR is now open The 2015 Education for All (EFA) Global Monitoring Report (GMR) will provide a definitive assessment of overall progress at the national, regional and global level toward the six EFA goals that were established in Dakar, Senegal, in 2000. EI strongly encourages its affiliates to participate in this consultation. >>>>> Beyond 2015: Putting girls' education at the heart of the agenda "Which government is prepared to tell a girl that she will never be able to go to school, and neither will her children or her grandchildren, but, if she is very lucky, her great-grandchild might be the first girl of her family to go to school?" asked EI President Susan Hopgood. She was one of the panellists at a side event to the 58th Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (UNCSW58) on 10 March 2014 that focused on putting girls' education at the heart of the post-2015 agenda. >>>>> How can education unions play an active role in ensuring that student performance is gender equal? At Education International's (EI) North America and Caribbean Regional Conference, held in Montego Bay on 24-26 February, Ms. Georgia Waugh Richards from the Jamaica Teachers' Association (JTA) suggested that in Caribbean countries "gender streaming" in education may help improve the performance of boys, who are lagging behind girls in school achievement. Ms. Richards's suggestion stirred a lively debate among the 120 participants representing member unions in 24 countries. >>>>> Push education to top of youth priorities for post-2015 agenda! On 18 February, the President of the UN General Assembly, John William Ashe, launched a Global Partnership on Youth in the Post-2015 Development Agenda, facilitated by the UN Secretary-General's Envoy on Youth, Ahmad Alhendawi. This will highlight youth priorities and give young people a chance to voice their own visions for the post-2015 agenda. Through an inclusive platform, young people will formulate concrete ideas that can be proposed for the inter-governmental deliberations. >>>>> Iceland: Strike over better conditions for teachers Following on the failure of negotiations on a new collective agreement for secondary school teachers, EI's national affiliate, the Kennarasamband Islands (KI), called on its members, upper secondary teachers employed by the state, to go on strike on 17 March. >>>>> More news is available on our website: www.ei-ie.org Education International is the voice of the teaching profession worldwide. A global federation of over 400 member unions in more than 170 contries and territories, it represents 30 million teachers and education workers form pre-school to university. For more information please contact the EI Secretariat: tel: + 32 2 224 06 11 E-mail: communications@ei-ie.org