Pupils to go home

Press, 23 August 1979, Page 4

Pupils to go home

Some schools, with few staffing problems, may close less than two hours a week. The organisers say the aim of the campaign is to let the public know how much teachers have been “papering over the cracks” in the education system. The first two weeks of next term have been set aside for a publicity campaign. Teachers will use the time to hold public meetings and explain their position to association members not at the conference. They hope to win the support of individual boards of governors for their action by attending meetings and explaining their action. In some areas, such as where children rely on a bus service, it may be impossible to close classes for hour-long periods. In these cases the conference advised teachers to take their compensatory time in other ways, such as sending one class home for a whole day, or only teaching after school hours when they will be paid overtime. Teachers will also refuse any extra duties handed out by the Education Department unless they are given time allowances. Phase two of the association’s protest action, set down to start next year, may mean classes will close for longer periods and teachers will refuse to supervise correspondence lessons or to teach large classes. The Minister of Education (Mr Wellington) last evening branded action by secondary school teachers which could close schools for two hours a week next term as “blatant unionism,” the Press Association reports from Wellington. It'was the same type of tactics the teachers had adopted over the marking of School Certificate papers, he said. He would again recommend to the Cabinet that the Government take no action over the teachers’ problems while the Government was under threat. Mr Wellington will discuss with Education Department officials contingency plans which might be necessary if the teachers’ proposals are carried out. The P.P.T.A. proposal was “an astonishing move for teachers to take,” said Mr Wellington, considering they professed to have the interests of pupils at heart. The teachers appeared to have deliberately picked the third term for their action because of the pressures pupils faced from examinations, he said.