European protests aginst the commercialization of education !

national | miscellaneous | news report Wednesday May 08, 2002 21:49 by Rene Schuijlenburg - EU Students info at education-is-not-for-sale dot org

Demonstrations in Seville during EU summit

In many European countries there will be protests aginst the commercialization of education this summer. From June 20 until 22 students from across Europe will protest together during the EU summit in Seville

Education is not for sale
newsletter number 9
May 04 2002

In this newsletter of the campaign against the commercialisation of education and the GATS treaty, we will write something about the mobilization for the upcoming protests during the Forum of the OECD and the Worldbank about trade and education in Washington. Further an article about documents of the German government about GATS (Read also our website with a lot of information about GATS, a WTO treaty). You will also find an article about the upcoming protests of school students and students in Seville, Spain, during the EU summit in June.

1. What is Education is not for sale!
2. Protests during the Forum about education and trade on May 23-24
3. Protests in Seville during the EU summit on June 20,21 and 22
4. German government answered questions about GATS

1. What is Education is not for sale!

For all of you that don't know the campaign education is not for sale! yet: Education is not for sale is a loose network of students, school students, professors and teachers who are campaigning against the commercialisation of education and the GATS treaty. The network was started by a few students from Dortmund, Germany, with a call for a week of protests in December 2001 across the European Union. During this week there were strikes, occupations of schools and universities, demonstrations and a lot of other protests against the commercialisation of education in many European cities like for instance Berlin, Bochum, Halle, Augsburg, Potsdam, Cologne (All Germany), Madrid, Salamanca, Barcelona, Seville, Madrid (All Spain), Montpellier (France), Thessalonica, Athens, Patras (All Greece), Utrecht (Netherlands), Brussels (Belgium) and many more cities. At the end of the week of protests many students from across Europe marched in a demonstration in Brussels during the EU summit. At December 14 there was an international meeting of around 150 students and school students in Brussels where they decided to continue the protests in 2002. This year students from Asia, the USA, Canada, Australia and European countries who are not a
member of the European Union joined the network and signed the call education is not for sale on our website ( you or your organization can sign the call to, more information at www.education-is-not-for-sale.org ). The first teachers and
professors signed the call as well. Discussions are being organized through our mailing lists and at many local, regional, national and international meetings.

2. Protests during the Forum about education and trade on May 23-24

In many countries there will be protests at a decentralized level during the Forum about education and trade in Washington DC which is being organized by the
Worldbank and the OECD. During the conference politicians and people of the education industry from across the world will talk about the commercialisation of education. One of the items they are going to talk about is GATS and
education. In Germany students and school students will start a series of protests against tuition fees and the commercialisation of education on May 23.
At the first day, students and schoolstudents will surround a conference of the misisters of of education from all German states in the state of Hessen.In the weeks after this action there will be be many small actions, a demonstration in the city of Düsseldorf and a social Forum about education. The protests will continue for the rest of the summer semester. Some universities consider a strike, especially because of new developments in the state of Nordrhein Westfalen where the state government is proposing a new fee which students would have to pay directly to the treasury department. Above that the state government is also considering to stop payments to the„studentenwerke", a university body that subsidize food for students in their cantinas, apartments for students etc. It will make food much more expensive at the university cantinas and apartments as well. In Austria the AKS is mobilizing in several Austrian cities for protests during the OECD/Worldbank conference. In Brussels there will be protests as well. In many cities across the globe there will be protests during the Forum, if you want an action to be announced or reported after the protest took place, write to our media-group:
[email protected]
We also have had reports that students in Washington DC will organize a demonstration to but we have lost contact about that.

3. Protests against the commercialisation of education in Europe and beyond in Seville during the EU summit on June 20,21 and 22

After the demonstrations in Barcelona on March 16 and the forum about education and culture in Salamanca on March 17-19 where students from all over Europe adopted the Salamanca declaration (read the declaration at our website:
www.education-is-not-for-sale.org )and did a demonstration at the last day of the forum, students teachers and school students are mobilizing for an Europe-wide demonstration against the commercialisation of education in Europe and beyond and the repression against students by the spanish state (a lot of students who where protesting against the L.O.U., a new spanish neo-liberal education law where arrested and 6 students of the university of Sevilla where expelled of the university because of their political activities) and during the EU summit in Seville at June 21. At June 20 there will be an international meeting of the education is not for sale network in Seville, one of the items we want to discuss is the protests in the 2nd part of 2002, during the EU presidency of Denmark. At June 22 we want to join the big demonstration against the Europe of cappital in a student and school student block.

4. German government answered questions about GATS

At the beginning of 2002 a few members of parliament of the German socialist party asked the German government 19 questions concerning the GATS negotiations.
The answer of the German government came at April 18 and about the questions related to education, the government answered that the European Union (which is
negotiating the GATS treaty for its member states) said that one of the EU member states proposed to demand the United States to open up their market for
higher education on the same level as the European Union did in 1995. The proposal isn't discussed enough inside the European Union yet. Furthermore the German government said that in Germany itself the question of exact demands for
educational services are not finished yet...

Interesting is that the German government said that the commission of the German states for education and research had a meeting with experts on GATS and that
they will work on the subject of GATS and education in the future as well. Germany is a federal state and the state governments, not the federal government, are responsible for education. The states coordinate their policies
and discuss their different views in this commission.

The federal government repeated in their answer that Germany didn't make any demands concerning education to states outside the European Union yet, but if
they do later, they will take care to strengthen the position of the German educational system on the international education market. The European union has
separated the private- and state provided education until now. The EU only made commitments in GATS for the privately financed education providers.

In question number 9 the members of parliament asked how the federal government thinks about the criticism of unions, ngo´s and student organizations that the
GATS treaty could undermine the state responsibility and could cause a privatisation of education. The Federal government answered that article I, 3b and c of the GATS treaty are excluding services that are exclusively provided by the state and that its not a goal of the treaty to privatise and deregulate services. What the German government didn't say is that education in Germany is
not exclusively provided by the state, there are private schools and universities as well. And of course its not a goal of the GATS treaty to deregulate and privatise services, the goal of the treaty is to get market
access and make profits in other countries but in the end that will deregulate and commercialise services.

The Federal government also said they provided several industry lobby groups and the workers union DGB with a document of 1600 pages with drafts of the European
Union concerning the ongoing GATS negotiations. The documents are confidential (but... you can read most of them on www.gatswatch.org ) and the EU still have to
vote on some of them. The government also said that the documents are not for a broad audience but that its not out of the question that the German parliament will get the documents...

You can read the complete document in German (with answers concerning GATS and water supply, healthcare etc) with the answers of the German government in German at the German speaking pages of our website ( www.education-is-not-for-sale.org )

Contact: [email protected]

Websites:
http://www.education-is-not-for-sale.org
http://www.forosocialsevilla.org/
Website of Salamanca students (who organized the forum at March 17-19):
http://www.geocities.com/observaglobal/ (Spanish/English/)

Mailinglists:

English (The international list):
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/international-pupil-and-studentactions
or send an empty e-mail to:
[email protected]

German:
http://de.groups.yahoo.com/group/int-schueler-und-studentenaktionen

Dutch:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/int-scholieren-en-studentenakties