On Friday evening, the Network of Action Committees for Safe Education held its largest online meeting to date. Around 40 participants from all over Germany spent almost three hours discussing their experiences at the height of the pandemic. New record infections and deaths were reported at the same time. The high numbers for weeks are pushing the health system to its limits.
–Student at a Hessian school in a crowded cafeteria (source: irresponsible.org)
Under these conditions, the initiative to set up action committees for safe education has met with growing interest. Several representatives of ongoing student protests and school strikes took part in the meeting. Together with the attending parents, teachers and educators, they reflected a cross-section of the broad opposition to the unsafe conditions in schools and daycare centers.
The central subject of the discussion was a declaration that the International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) and the Socialist Equality Party (SGP) had brought to the assembly. After the discussion, the declaration was adopted by an overwhelming majority.
In the declaration, the action committees state that the policy of open schools and companies is being promoted by “governments of all stripes” and exclusively serves the profit interests of banks and corporations. Therefore, action committees should be set up independently of the Bundestag parties and the trade unions, so the call.
“We are resolutely opposed to this policy, which puts the interests of the rich before people’s health, and call on students, teachers, educators and parents to take their safety into their own hands,” it says. Therefore school strikes must be called immediately if the demands of the students and teachers are not implemented.
Ultimately, the students, parents and teachers realize that the action committees have to network internationally and turn to the struggles of the workers. “That is why the resistance in schools must be combined with the struggles of workers for safe operations and to defend their jobs. It must be part of a broad mobilization for a general strike that enforces the needs and health of the people against the logic of profit. “
During the discussion, students, teachers and educators from ten cities reported in detail about their situation and thus provided further evidence that the explanation was correct.