[this letter is also available in German, French, Bengali, Serbian, Croatian and Italian]

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Hamburg (Germany), May 24th 2009

In Solidarity with all people who are struggling for free and emancipatory education

Hello pupils, students, trade unionists, teachers, parents and all who are fighting for free and emancipatory public Education around the world!!

We are people from more than 60 cities across Germany and we are seeing our current and upcoming protests as part of the global struggle. We are also discussing the current structures and restructuring efforts within the public education system in Germany and around the world (e.g. the Bologna process [on the European level] and tuition fees [on the local and global level]). We are fighting for free and independent (from state and commercial interests) public education for all, as well as a society, which would enable such an education system.

Right now we are preparing for a week of protest in more than 60 cities across Germany from June 15th until June 19th. Protests will include alternative workshops and seminars (16/06), demonstrations (17/06), actions of civil disobedience (18/06), as well as protests against the Bologna process (celebrating its 10th “anniversary”) in Berlin (19/06). All actions are organized and co-ordinated by local alliances, which include pupil and student representative bodies, unions, parents, teaching staff and others. We are solidarising us with your struggles in schools, universities and workplaces worldwide! We also need your support.

Please send a short message of support to: (if possible in English) before June 17th!

Only united we can win the struggle for a just and solidary world!

Bundesweites Bildungsstreikbündnis (German federal protest co-ordination assembly”)

PS: an overview of education protests this year (2009) so far can be accessed here.

PPS: to connect with groups internationally feel free to send a mail to: united.for.education[at]gmail.com

taken during the
"International Day of Action against the Commercialisation of Education"
on Nov. 5th 2008 on campus of the University of Dhaka [Bangladesh]

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Reactions recevied so far:

Students in Bangladesh are supporting your struggle!

The problems of education seem similar to east and west, “first world” and “third world” countries. The students of Bangladesh are burdened with tuition fees and other expenses like costs of books, dormitory fees etc. And The burdens are increasing exponentially. The other important thing is the little state support for the public education system. The majority of High School graduates will not get an opportunity to enter less expensive public universities.The commercialisation of the public education system is supported by the government. The most alarming thing is, that the private universities only admit students for a few profitable subjects like Business Administration or Computer Science or Electrical Engineering or Telecommunication Engineering.

The government with the help of the commercial media demoralizes the students and always tells them that education is not for free and that it is normal to pay for quality education and that education is a market product.

And they keep telling that especially higher education is not free anywhere in the world.

So the parents of students must carry all expenses and the only duty of students is to attent their lessons. No rallies and no protests are necessary, they say. The call by the global student movement and the “Bildungsstreik” in Germany inspires the students of Bangladesh and this shows the true picture student movements worldwide.

We are in Solidarity with you!
Tarek Ahmad; Dhaka [Bangladesh]

[Tarek Ahmad also translated the "letter of support" into Bengali for us. It can be accessed here. Thanks for that!]

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Support to “Bildungsstreik”

Dear colleagues!

Just like our colleagues in other Croatian towns (Zagreb, Zadar, Rijeka, Pula, Osijek and Varaždin) students from Split, also gathered around the “Independent Student Initiative for the Right to Free Education“, occupied their Faculties (University of Split) during the Global Week of Action (and furthermore) as a sign of protest against the commercialisation of education. At one point, we held four Faculties under occupation. We organized this action demanding the right to free education for all and the elimination of all tuition fees, at all levels of higher education: undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate. We heard about your struggle and we want to express our great solidarity with the international fight for emancipating and free education which you are fighting now. The educational system of today is making the students, de facto, employees of their respective faculties, even though they are the ones who are paying for their studies very costly, while their work time is “payed” with a fixed amount of ECTS points. Our free time has been violently taken away from us (our professors as well), making us uncompromising executives of the system itself.

We stand in solidarity with every movement which implements ideals of freedom and autonomy in its own fight, and on the universities.

Persist on common goal, the struggle continues!

“Independent Student Initiative for the Right to Free Education”
Split, [Croatia]

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Answer to your Call and “support list”

Dear activists,

The French union, Laic Students Trade Union (Syndicat Etudiant Unitaire et Laïque – SEUL) supports and answers positively to the “German federal protest co-ordination assembly”‘s (Bundesweites Bildungsstreik Bündnis) call. We’re struggling against the privatisation of higher education in France and we’re participating in the European Wave Collective. By the way, we were also present at the European’s mobilization at Leuven (+Louvain and Brussels) in Belgium. We’re going to spread your call and we ask you to put us on your list of supporters.

Please find our declaration about your mobilization attached. [file I + file II]

Our website [in French]: http://fseul.free.fr

With trade-union greetings,

Emeric; for the SEUL [France]

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Stop Bolonia; Education by all and for all!

Salud compañeros!

I want to wish you a very good fight and I hope you achieve your goals. Here, in Spain, we are fighting too (I know you know that). Maybe we meet soon. Maybe we, all the people, will build another education system, thinking internationally and globally.

Stay like that and keep fighting! All the power to the assembly/people!!

Nicolás Cardozo [Spain]

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You have my humble support!

I believe in the purity of your noble goals! There are many young people who are not able to get a higher education because they cannot afford it. It’s plain stupid to withhold a capable young person of becoming even more accomplished just because he’s not rich enough. Tuition fees are getting higher, making things even worse. A society’s goal is to have a lot of educated people, but contradictory they are making this very difficult. If politicians want more educated people in order to, in the end, have a greater GDP they should invest in such a project! Maybe they don’t know how it is for parents with average incomes to put their kids through college. It’s almost impossible and generates a lot of problems for such families, with their kids becoming frustrated and over-pressured because their families are suffering in order for them to get a higher education – simple mistakes become huge. Maybe it should not be free, but it should at least be calibrated in compliance to the economical powers of wide population.

All of us should live better, and our countries are suppose to exist for the people, not the other way around!
All the best! I hope you/we can accomplish something good!

Best wishes from Belgrade!

Vladimir Ilić [Serbia]

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Keep on fighting!

Hello,

it’s great to hear that the struggle goes on also in other countries. I will print your message and spread it around Turku University. Maybe your message will encourage students to demonstrate also here in Finland. Maybe you have heard, but the new university bill is suppose to be passed in the Finnish parliament around the dates when your action week will be held. We have high hopes that our demonstrations will make the parliament change the bill for the better, although not as good as we had wanted.

Regards,

Elias Laitinen [Finland]

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Solidarity for Free Education!

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Solidarity from Minneapolis (U.S. of A.)

Graduate students and workers at the University of Minnesota support German and transnational struggles for free and emancipatory public education!

Raphi Rechitsky [U.S.A.]

Support from Serbia! I support your fight!
Good luck!

Cristian Cacovan [Serbia]

Graduate Education must be the first thing that is going to change, or the change for a better world will never come. We all must unite, or unity is going to remain just a word with no meaning.

You have my thanks and support,

Perisic Aleksandar [Serbia]

Dear colleagues,

I, as a teacher and researcher in the University of Paris 8 – Saint-Denis in struggle, also support your actions against the consequences of the Bologna Process on public education.

Sincerely yours,
C. Vidal-Gomel [France]

Greetings from University Paris XI.

Here in France, we fight against the same forces: commercialisation of knowledge, education and research.

Keep resisting !

******

Jean-Michel Guillon [France]
Laboratoire Ecologie, Systématique et Evolution

ese.u-psud.fr/bases/upresa/pages/guillon/

Refusons d’être les complices actifs d’une politique scientifique désastreuse: sauvonslarecherche.fr/spip.php?article2147

Schlagworte: education, international, solidarity, struggle

Dieser Beitrag wurde am Freitag, 29. Mai 2009 um 19:25 Uhr veröffentlicht und unter Aktuelles, News, Presse gespeichert. Sie können Kommentare zu diesem Eintrag über den RSS-2.0-Feed verfolgen. Momentan ist weder das Kommentieren noch das Setzen eines Trackbacks möglich.