Public school teachers still on strike

By Katie

No one has felt the effects of the political crisis more than the students of public schools in Honduras. Since the coup occured on June 28, the public school students have not been to school more than three days a week in most cases. The teachers' union is very strong and is has been striking for eight weeks to show their support of the ousted president, Mel Zelaya. For the first three weeks there was no school at all, and now they only strike Mondays and Tuesdays and give classes the other three days of the week.

This is infuriating because it is especially affecting the poor students in Honduras. Anyone who can at all afford it does not send their children to the public school. The teachers have a history of striking far too many days, so any other school is better than the public schools, as long as they give classes most of the time.

However, I do know some public school teachers who are fighting against their unions and truly looking out for the students they teach. One of these is my Spanish tutor, Delvin, who is the president of the local chapter of the teachers' union. He does not take a political stance in the Mel vs. Michelletti game, and does not support the strike because it is not the fault of the students that their president was ousted. He is working with a few local teachers to move the strike to only one day per week and to teach four days per week. He'd like to teach full five-day weeks, but realizes that there is only a small minority of teachers who want to stop the strike and sees the one/four option as a compromise.

Other teachers keep teaching despite demands on them not to. The teacher of the second graders in my neighborhood holds classes in the afternoons for struggling students on the days of the week when she is not supposed to be striking. Many of those kids are in my after-school program, so I make sure they go to her classes on those days so that I can show my support of her efforts. Other teachers are holding classes on Saturdays in order to keep educating their students.

Please pray with us that this situation gets resolved soon, and does not last the entire year. Pray especially for the strength of people like Delvin and the second grade teacher in our neighborhood who face strong opposition for their support of putting students first.


Photo from La Tribuna, a newspaper in Honduras. The school called Rafael Pineda Ponce says "We want classes, We want teachers".