OlehGirl.com
Standing with the students
Last night at the major mega rally to ouster Olmert I had several interesting conversations with students. One set of conversations was with very good friends who are ahem student strike breakers. They, in fact, fomented a strike against the strike and their graduate classes are now continuing in full swing. I love them dearly, we generally agree on every political and social issue that has arisen so far, and while I understand their position and the reasons they are against the strike, I don’t agree.
After I separated from said friends at the rally, I crossed the square in search of another set of friends (hanoarim) who had sent me a text message giving their location in hebrew and so I, of course, glanced at my list of messages, saw the hebrew and assumed it was my cell company telling me about some great matana (gift/deal) if I just pressed some nice set of numbers and so I had ignored it. When I checked my cell again and found another 5 messages showing up in hebrew I said, hrrmmm this is from someone I know. So off I went in search of people wearing blue and found them standing right close to the people wearing red –the protesting students. Between the blues and the reds I got a great deal more information about the background for the decision to strike and my support for their actions went from lukewarm yeah ok whatever to keep on keeping on.
An agreement with the previous government committee, after protracted negotiations, was reached. It was signed, sealed, but… not delivered. The Shochat Committee is going against almost every single element of the previous agreement. It is not just about the tuition hike –but the fact that it is coming on the heels of severe cuts in the government university funding. In the last five years, some NIS 1.2 billion have been cut from the budget for higher learning. The state’s investment in institutions of higher learning has declined by 14 percent over the last 5 years, during which time the number of students entering the university system has increased by 50%. Hi, kids it is now time for you to pay more for less. Much less. The Shochat committee is also undermining university employment contracts.
When you reach a deal you don’t renege. Go students!
| Print article | This entry was posted by Yael on May 4, 2007 at 3:10 pm, and is filed under Israel. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site. |
(Photo by Dani Machlis)
about 3 years ago
Hello dear! I am glad you love us dearly
now listen here though. It’s not that I don’t identify with their cause, I do. I knew there was a story behind it – no-one puts the whole country’s students on strike hopefully without legitimate cause – but I think the manner of protest (not the protest itself) was stupid. No-one cares if the students strike. And if the whole country is looking the other way – as they were this week – then nothing gets done and the students only endanger their own future. There have to be better ways of protesting what I agree is something that is very unfair and should be protested against. Students should not pay their fees, then the universities and hopefully the government will listen. Not do something which simply cuts off their own noses and doesn’t harm a single soul apart from them.
Anyway we love you dearly too
I think you should get one of your striking students to write up something for you to put on your blog – it might be interesting to hear their point of view from the horse’s mouth as it were.
about 3 years ago
Kat –I will see if I can get one of my students (hello, I know a number of you striking kids read my blog as you’ve told me as much –speak up!!) to comment. I will also call you ….
about 3 years ago
Hi Yael
Just read your post and wanted a chance to defend my point of view – I see Katherine has beaten me to it. I would like to add though that I the crumbling higher education system is indicative of a much deeper problem. The country is in disarray – you can feel it everywhere you go. Schools are striking. Railway workers are striking. Municipalities are not paying their employees. There is no discernible movement in the peace process. There doesn’t seem to be any good news these days.
What I mean to say, is that this is not a student issue, its a national issue. The students of today are unlikely to feel the rate hikes but rather students starting new degrees. The country will suffer in the future as more talented academic staff leave Israel in search of a living wage and companies will have to make do with graduates who have had a low standard of education.
The strike hasn’t been handled very well because the average man in the street sees the students as a bunch of spoiled brats who couldn’t be bothered to go to class. The strike should rather have focused on a media campaign to educate the Israeli public than mini-riots in Tel Aviv. Also, Katherine is right – If students feel so strongly about the strike – come next year – no-one should pay their fees. The strike would be settled in a matter of days.
I for one am not willing to lose out on a semester because some wannabe politicians at the Agudat Hastudentim wanted to add “Student Strike 2007″ to their CV.
Right – now let me get off my soap box.