Students with special needs left behind due to strike

The coordinator of the Other Citizen warned on Tuesday of the plight of dozens of children with disabilities affected by the teachers and staff strike, accusing some schools of neglecting these students.

Miguel Azevedo, coordinator of the Diversified Citizens Movement, told Lusa that at the start of classes in January, children were left outside the school, in school vans, waiting to absorb the impact of the strike.

After condemning the association, “schools got more careful, but over time they forgot,” he lamented, explaining that “many can no longer lock themselves inside a van, but leave them parked inside schools unattended, and people are very aware of the damage they cause “.

The strike, which began last December and has no end in sight, “affects hundreds if not thousands of students,” he lamented.

“In some groups, we have people with common sense who don’t leave children alone, but in the neighboring school, in the same group, they don’t use the same common sense,” said Luse, the association’s coordinator.

These kids need stability in their routine, which is why Miguel Azevedo states that “a plan B is needed so they don’t become helpless.”

Last Friday, the Department of Education asked for a definition of minimum services to ensure situations like those of these children, but the STOP union, which has been calling for a strike since December, rejected the custody offer.

According to Miguel Azevedo, “there must be common sense to fight for your rights without affecting the weakest. And those who work in this field know very well what harm it does to these students, not to mention others.”

“Others” are more than 350,000 needy students who are eligible for school social support because they belong to families with severe economic hardship.

“We are exacerbating the situation of poverty. There are many kids who only eat a day at school,” Miguel Azevedo warned, making sure parents were “not on either side” of the war between unions and custody.

Lusa asked the president of the National Association of Group and Public School Principals (ANDAEP) about whether meals are guaranteed for students most in need, but Filinto Lima said few schools are closed at lunchtime.

“Typically, teachers go on strike first, usually between 8:00 and 10:00. Then classes resume,” he explained, although he acknowledged that some schools are closed all day.

Filinto Lima acknowledged that this new strike model “is a great inconvenience for parents because they leave their children in schools but feel insecure.”

The Ministry also proposed to STOP the definition of minimum services guaranteeing student meals, but this was also rejected.

Filinto Lima declined to comment on the proposal, saying only that he was awaiting the decision of the arbitration commission and, if it was necessary to continue with minimal services, he asked that the information be clear and not questioned by schools.

Regarding negotiations between trustees and unions, ANDAEP’s president laments that “there is no light at the end of the tunnel”, given that he has entered into “total war: some send a minimum service bomb, others send one another march, others say they are too will participate in protests.

The unions engaged in a third round of talks last week to discuss a new model for hiring and placing teachers with the ministry, but the meetings ended without agreement, with a promise to keep the strikes going.

The strikes of teachers and non-teaching staff began last December and continue indefinitely.