Romanian Government Hopes Teachers Return to Classes but Union Says Strike Continues

The Romanian Government adopted an ordinance to force teachers to return to classes on Tuesday, the first working day after the mini-vacation from June 1 to June 5. The Government increased teachers’ salaries by EUR 100 EUR on average, but the unions are not happy with the measure.

On Thursday, June 1, the Romanian Government published the ordinance and said the negotiations were over. On the other hand, the unions’ representatives stated that the strike would continue, as teachers were unhappy with that decision.

The teachers’ strike paralyzed the society in Romania. While kids stay home, waiting to return to classes and finish their school year to start their vacation, the unions took to the streets asking for salaries starting from EUR 800 a month. They even threaten the current school year can be prolonged up to a few weeks. Some even said the year could be frozen altogether, as teachers refused to offer the final grades to the kids.

Some say teachers are pretty cheeky. With generations that prove to be less educated, year after year, as PISA tests show, it’s hard to pretend more rights and higher salaries. The failure of the education system in Romania is visible to anyone, and teachers have their fault for this. Less educated, naughty and misbehaving, generations after generations leave school with no purpose in life and no proper skills. The elites who perform at the International Olympiads leave Romania and settle in different countries, contributing to other societies’ success and quality of life.

This is the real context of the current strike, and teachers are the last professional category to ask anything from the Government in the current situation. Performance should be bonified, but what teachers do in Romania can hardly be called “performance”.

Will this EUR 100 contribute to a better education for Romanian kids? Not at all. And, with a teaching corp less inclined to increase the level of education in Romania, the money will be spent on food, bills or cosmetics — no doubt about that.