International unity on funding
Education International (EI) General Secretary David Edwards has raised the alarm on the growing global teacher shortage and called for increased public education funding in his speech at the launch event of a new global education campaign from EI’s new global campaign.
Go Public! Fund Education is an urgent call for governments to invest in public education, a fundamental human right and public good, and to invest more in teachers, the single most important factor in achieving quality education.
“The alarming and growing global teacher shortage is threatening the right to education everywhere,” Mr Edwards said.
“This shortage denies our students their right to learn, it denies them the bright futures they deserve.
“The causes are well known to us. The teacher shortage is a direct consequence of the imposition of failed neoliberal policies: austerity measures, a lack of investment in teachers, and the privatisation of education.”
The solution to the worldwide shortage of teachers is clear: increasing public education funding, investing in teachers, guaranteeing labour rights and ensuring good working conditions.
Go Public! Fund Education will support the efforts of education unions everywhere to improve pay, working conditions, and ensure the respect educators deserve.
Education unions around the world are joining forces to build inclusive quality public education for all. We are mobilising to fully fund public education systems and resist budget cuts, austerity and privatisation.
This means guaranteeing labour rights and ensuring good working conditions, as well as manageable workloads and competitive salaries for teachers and education workers.
It also means valuing teachers, respecting teachers, ensuring they are central to decision-making and trusting their pedagogical expertise.
“We need manageable workloads and competitive salaries,” Mr Edwards said.
“We need to value teachers, respect teachers, we need to ensure they are central to decision-making, and we need to trust their pedagogical expertise.
“We will stand united and mobilise to pressure governments to fully fund public education and invest in the teaching profession.”
The Global Commission on the Teaching Profession (GCTP), a high-level expert group to address the global teacher shortage, was formed at the United Nations Transforming Education Summit of 2022.
The GCTP represents a key opportunity to organise and mobilise as unions and as a profession to advance our policy objectives and empower our profession.
“Education International will be the voice of the profession, your voice, to make sure teachers and education workers are at the table every step of the way,” Mr Edwards said.
Mr Edwards called on all EI’s member organisations to join the campaign as they mobilise in their local context.
“We need to mobilise at the local, national, regional and global level so that all governments commit to funding public education to make sure we have the working conditions we need to teach and our students have the environment they need to learn,” he said.
We are working together across borders to guarantee every student’s right to have a well-supported qualified teacher and a quality learning environment. Let’s act together in solidarity to “Go Public and Fund Education”.
