North America/ Canada/ 11.02.2020/ Source: globalnews.ca.
Elementary teachers hit the picket lines Wednesday at several school boards, including in Ottawa, as part of their rotating strikes that appear to have no end in sight.
The Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario (ETFO) escalated its job action this week and is now targeting each board twice a week, including provincewide strikes set for Thursday and Feb. 11.
Union president Sam Hammond said Tuesday that the union was close to a deal with the government after three days of talks last week, but the province’s negotiators suddenly tabled new proposals at the 11th hour that ETFO couldn’t accept.
The two sides were close to an agreement on three or four key issues when the government changed course, Hammond said, and now there are no new bargaining dates scheduled.
Education Minister Stephen Lecce has said the government has put forward “reasonable proposals.”
ETFO members are off the job Wednesday in the Ottawa-Carleton, Kawartha Pine Ridge, Keewatin-Patricia, Lakehead, Near North, Penetanguishene Protestant Separate, Rainy River, Simcoe County and Upper Canada school boards, as well as the Ottawa Children’s Treatment Centre.
All four major teachers’ unions have been without contracts since Aug. 31, and bargaining is only ongoing with the union representing French teachers. High school teachers have not had talks with the government since Dec. 16, and English Catholic teachers had one day of negotiations Monday after talks broke off last month, but nothing further is scheduled.
All unions are engaged in some form of job action.
Source of the notice: https://globalnews.ca/news/6509138/elementary-teachers-strike-eastern-northern-ontario-ottawa-feb-5/
North America/ Canada/ 11.02.2020/ Source: globalnews.ca.
All four of Ontario’s major teacher unions will soon be holding weekly strikes after the group representing instructors in the French school system announced its intention to escalate its job actions against the provincial government.
The Association des enseignantes et des enseignants franco-ontariens (AEFO) said it will begin holding provincewide walkouts once a week starting Thursday after contract talks with the government stalled.
AEFO has 12,000 members in the French-language elementary and high school system and had until now only been engaged in a multi-phased work-to-rule campaign.
Union president Remi Sabourin said a lack of progress at the bargaining table forced AEFO to escalate to “Phase 3” to send a message to Premier Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservative government.
“Phase 3 is meant to convey to the government that we can’t just keep staring at each other pointlessly at the bargaining table,” he said in a statement.
Source of the notice: https://globalnews.ca/news/6521841/ontario-teacher-strike-french-educators-walkouts/
The coronavirus outbreak may be the biggest disruption to international student flows in history.
There are more than 100,000 students stuck in China who had intended to study in Australia this year. As each day passes, it becomes more unlikely they will arrive in time for the start of the academic year.
After the September 11 attacks in 2001, the United States closed its borders temporarily and tightened student visa restrictions, particularly for students from the Middle East. Thousands were forced to choose different study destinations in the following years.
In 2018, Saudi Arabia’s government instructed all its citizens studying in Canada to return home, in protest at the Canadian foreign minister’s call to release women’s rights activists held in Saudi jails.
A significant proportion of the 12,000 or so Saudi students in Canada left to continue their studies elsewhere, before the Saudi government quietly softened its stance.
So we have seen calamities before, but never on this scale. There are a few reasons for this.
Why this is worse than before
The current temporary migration of students from China to Australia represents one of the largest education flows the world has ever seen. Federal education department data show there were more than 212,000 Chinese international students in Australia by the end of 2019.
It’s also difficult to imagine a worse time for this epidemic to happen for students heading to the southern hemisphere than January to February, at the end of our long summer break.
Many Chinese students had returned home for the summer and others were preparing to start their studies at the end of February.
By comparison, the SARS epidemic in 2003 didn’t significantly dent international student enrolments in Australia because it peaked around April-May 2003, well after students had started the academic year.
Ending in July that year, the SARS outbreak infected fewer than half the number of people than have already contracted coronavirus. Even during the SARS outbreak Australia didn’t implement bans on those travelling from affected countries.
What will the impact be?
This crisis hits hard for many Chinese students, an integral component of our campus communities. It not only causes disruptions to their study, accommodation, part-time employment and life plans, but also their mental well-being.
A humane, supportive and respectful response from the university communities is vital at this stage.
Australia has never experienced such a sudden drop in student numbers.
The reduced enrolments will have profound impacts on class sizes and the teaching workforce, particularly at masters level in universities with the highest proportions of students from China. Around 46% of Chinese students are studying a postgraduate masters by coursework. If classes are too small, universities will have to cancel them.
And the effects don’t end there. Tourism, accommodation providers, restaurants and retailers who cater to international students will be hit hard too.
Chinese students contributed A$12 billion to the Australian economy in 2019, so whatever happens from this point, the financial impact will be significant. The cost of the drop in enrolments in semester one may well amount to several billion dollars.
The newly-formed Global Reputation Taskforce by Australia’s Council for International Education has commissioned some rapid response research to promote more informed discussion about the implications and impacts of the crisis.
If the epidemic is contained quickly, some of the 100,000 students stuck in China will be able to start their studies in semester one, and the rest could delay until mid-year. But there might still be longer-term effects.
Australia has a world-class higher education system and the world is closely watching how we manage this crisis as it unfolds.
Prospective students in China will be particularly focused on Australia’s response as they weigh future study options.
The world is watching
Such a fast-moving crisis presents a range of challenges for those in universities, colleges (such as English language schools) and schools who are trying to communicate with thousands of worried students who can’t enter the country.
Australian universities are scrambling to consider a wide range of responses. These include:
delivering courses online
providing intensive courses and summer or winter courses
arrangements around semester commencement
fee refund and deferral
provision of clear and updated information
support structures for starting and continuing Chinese students, including extended academic and welfare support, counselling, special helplines, and coronavirus-specific information guidelines
support with visa issues, accommodation and employment arrangements.
A coordinated approach involving different stakeholders who are providing different supports for Chinese students is an urgent priority. This includes education providers, government, city councils, international student associations, student groups and professional organisations.
Source of the review: https://theconversation.com/the-coronavirus-outbreak-is-the-biggest-crisis-ever-to-hit-international-education-131138
Asia/ South Korea/ 03.02.2020/ Source: www.koreaherald.com.
According to the Ministry of Education, 245 kindergartens, 53 elementary schools, 21 middle schools, 16 high schools and one special-education school postponed reopening following the month-long winter vacation or halted operations to rein in the spread of the coronavirus.
Most of the schools affected by the virus are in Suwon, Bucheon or Goyang in Gyeonggi Province, Gunsan in North Jeolla Province and in Seoul, where those infected with the virus have come from or visited.
Schools in areas considered to be vulnerable to the spread of the virus are now allowed to make a decision at their discretion on whether to temporarily close doors through prior consultations with regional educational authorities.
Education authorities in Suwon and Bucheon ordered all kindergartens and some elementary and middle and high schools in the cities to close for a week.
Authorities in Goyang recommended closure for all its kindergartens in the city for one week. However, only nine out of 157 kindergartens were closed, which led the ministry to revise the total number of kindergartens from 393 to 245 in the afternoon.
In Seoul, a total of nine schools — one kindergarten, three elementary schools, two middle schools and three high schools — were temporarily shut.
In Gunsan, all kindergartens, elementary, middle and high schools were ordered to close for two weeks.
Nurseries in Taean in South Chungcheong Province, Gunsan in North Jeolla Province and cities in Gyeonggi Province — Suwon, Bucheon, Pyeongtaek, Anyang and Goyang — were closed starting Monday.
Amid growing fears over the further spread of the virus upon Chinese students’ return to Korea for a new semester, the ministry said it plans to review whether to delay the reopening of universities this week.
There were an estimated 71,067 Chinese students studying at universities in Korea as of 2019, accounting for 44.4 percent of all foreign students here.
A total of 112 students and school officials are currently in self-imposed isolation after visiting the province, according to a survey of 242 universities by the ministry.
Meanwhile, 21 Korean students and school officials who visited China’s Hubei province, the epicenter of the new coronavirus, less than two weeks ago remain in self-imposed isolation, as they are not showing any symptoms of the virus, according to the ministry.
Korea has confirmed 15 cases of the coronavirus that is believed to have originated in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, with 913 people having come into contact with those infected with the virus, according to health authorities.
Starting from Tuesday, South Korea will temporarily ban foreigners who have visited Hubei province within 14 days from entering the country, and everyone who came in contact with those infected with the virus will be required to quarantine themselves for two weeks.
The coronavirus outbreak has killed at least 362 people and infected more than 17,300 globally. There are now at least 179 confirmed cases of the virus in more than 27 countries and territories outside mainland China.
One person outside mainland China, a 44-year-old Chinese man in the Philippines, has died. Sweden and Spain reported those countries’ first cases over the weekend.
Source of the notice: http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20200203000896
A school building has collapsed in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, killing at least seven children. Scores were also injured in the accident, which residents and others blame on shoddy construction.
A two-story school building made of corrugated metal and wood collapsed in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, early on Monday, with at least seven of the school’s roughly 800 pupils killed by falling debris.
Two of the 64 children injured remain in critical condition. The disaster occurred shortly after lessons at the privately run school, The Precious Talent Top School, had begun for the day.
Many residents of the suburb of Dagoretti, where the collapse took place, blamed bad building methods for the accident.
«You can easily break it with your own hands, as easy as that,» said one resident, Peter Ouko. «This is chicken wire, not a construction material, and someone had the guts to use this to build a construction for our kids. I think this is basically premeditated murder.»
The school will be closed for the next four days, according to the Kenyan education minister
Lack of regulation
The MP for Dagoretti, John Kiarie, told KTN television the accident demonstrated that there was no proper «regulation of educational institutions, especially those in informal settlements … regulations that pertain to the construction and stability of educational institutions.»
Numerous buildings in Nairobi and other cities have collapsed in recent years, often causing deaths. Kenya has experienced a booming construction industry in the past few years, but corruption is rampant, allowing contractors to ignore regulations and safety standards.
Source of the notice: https://www.dw.com/en/kenya-school-collapse-kills-several-children/a-50553375
«The scene starts with nameless slaves [number] one and two getting pushed towards the ship by the slave owner and a child is acting as the slave owner.»
«I was trying to make sense of the whipping of the children, the children were going to be whipping the slaves,» Mr Parker told local TV.
Ms Parker – who moved from Georgia to Connecticut to become assistant professor of psychiatry at Yale University to research racism in medicine – said no teacher at her daughter’s school in Georgia would have assigned that play to students.
The teacher, who is white, has been placed on administrative leave, pending the outcome of an investigation. A local schools official said the play was not a part of the curriculum, and that it had not been approved by the district.
Ms Parker said blaming the teacher was not the solution.
«Teachers are not the scapegoat for a system that is clearly broken and has been suppressing minority voices and the voices of those with disabilities,» she told a local education committee on Tuesday.
Sourse and Image: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-51308746
Europe/United Kingdom/02-02-2020/ Author and Source: www.rt.com
Leading private schools in England have criticized plans to improve access to top universities for poorer students, saying it could lead to discrimination of rich kids based on “class,” provoking ridicule on social media.
The Headmasters’ & Headmistresses’ Conference (HMC), an association that represents some of the UK’s most expensive private schools, voiced concerns about proposals published on Wednesday by the Office for Students, the higher education regulator for England.
Mike Buchanan, the HMC’s executive director, claimed universities should expand to accommodate as many “truly suitable students” as needed, rather than “rob some students of a future to award it to others.” He argued that institutions must look at their international students intake rather than restrict places to UK students “based on their class.”Plans being put forward by the regulator include a promise to halve the access gap at England’s most selective institutions in the next five years, increasing the amount of disadvantaged students by 6,500 a year from 2024-25.
The seemingly hostile reaction from elite private schools has, perhaps unsurprisingly, prompted much mockery online, with many people expressing little sympathy with their “predicament,” with one person tweeting: “I have a tiny violin. Somewhere.”
Guardian columnist Frances Ryan sarcastically remarked that being discriminated based on class sounded like a “terrible education system,” adding: “We should totally do something to fix that.” Others online mercilessly attacked the premise that the “kids of the rich and greedy” deserve sympathy because they’re being attacked based on their “accident-of-birth privilege.”
Some accused the private schools of being “actual Marvel villains,” while another Twitter user claimed the “lack of self-awareness is astounding.”
Kalwant Bhopal, a professor of education and justice at Birmingham University, said that it was clear that young people going to independent fee-paying schools were “more likely to be middle-class,” adding that “these schools continue to perpetuate privilege.”
Fuente e Imagen: https://www.rt.com/uk/479471-private-schools-poor-students-universities/
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