Foreign student killed school principal: Teachers' unions are going on strike!

Teachers' unions have decided to take action following the fatal shooting of İbrahim Oktugan, a teacher and school principal, by Y.K., an individual allegedly of Iraqi origin, at the Private Eyüpsultan Final Academy Anatolian High School in Eyüpsultan.

Türk Eğitim Sen, Hürriyetçi Eğitim Sen, and Eğitim Gücü Sen have announced decisions to boycott classes and go on strike.

"HOW MANY MORE LIVES WILL WE LOSE"

Talip Geylan, Chairman of Türk Eğitim Sen, who decided to boycott the first class on Thursday, May 9, made the following statement:

”No to violence against educators! On Thursday, we will not attend the first class, we will raise our voices with press statements in all our schools, and we say 'enough is enough!' How many more lives will we lose before legal regulations are enacted to introduce effective measures to prevent violence against our colleagues? I invite all our colleagues to support our voice and to attend classes wearing black cockades/ribbons until the weekend.”

"HAS REACHED A PEAK"

Eğitim Gücü Sen also decided to hold a 1-day strike on Thursday, May 9. Chairman Oğuz Özat stated the following:

”Teacher murders and violence have reached a peak. As Eğitim Gücü Sen, we are going on strike on Thursday, and all our provincial chairs will hold press statements in front of the national education directorates. On Thursday, within the framework of our national tour program, we are in Bolu. As the chairman, together with our Bolu provincial chair and our General Headquarters board members, I will participate in the press statement in front of the Bolu National Education Directorate. As Eğitim Gücü Sen, which was the first to react and the first to decide on action regarding teacher murder and violence, we say 'It could be you tomorrow, my teacher,' and we demand security guards and a law on violence against teachers from the Ministry of National Education. We say enough is enough; we request all our teachers to participate in our action decision, whether they are members or not.”

Hürriyetçi Eğitim Sen, on the other hand, decided to go on strike on Friday, May 10, to protest violence in education.

"LET'S NOT JUST GO THROUGH THE MOTIONS"

In his statement, Chairman Levent Kuruoğlu noted the following:

”As Hürriyetçi Eğitim Sen, we have always strived to take strike action decisions together with all unions. We have been calling for days against violence towards teachers and education workers. However, we must pursue such an important issue in unity without wasting it with populist approaches. We cannot stop violence or solve our problems with cockade actions that will yield no results, by not attending one hour of class, or by taking action on different days rather than a common day—in other words, by just going through the motions. I repeat, let's not just go through the motions with our actions. Let's put all our differences aside and be in the squares across the country on Friday, May 10. Let's say stop to violence.”

News Source: 12punto