News

Teachers divided on union action

By Chathuri Dissanayake

The Ceylon Teachers’ Union, which has broken away from an alliance of other teacher unions on the issue of salary anomalies, has asked its members to refrain from doing any extra duties outside their core classroom duties until the salary anomalies are completely rectified.

The trade union action means that teachers will refuse to be involved in all school support services and other duties. These include the distribution of textbooks, student admissions and various forms of administrative work.

Currently, these duties are being handled by teachers in government schools in order to facilitate the smooth running of these institutions. “We will not be performing these extra duties – we will stick to just our teaching duties,” said Joseph Stalin, president of the Ceylon Teachers’ Union. “We will keep up this action until the salary anomalies are addressed and a proper solution found.”

According to Mr. Stalin, teachers of his union will attend seminars held after school hours only if they received a participation allowance. They will not take up any duties that were not related to teaching, inside or outside schools, he said.

Meanwhile, the three other main teacher unions, led by the Ceylon Teacher Services Union, have said they will not support the Ceylon Teachers’ Union in their latest move. “We will not show support for this action called by the Ceylon Teachers’ Union,” said Mahinda Jayasinghe, president of the Ceylon Teacher Services Union.

“And we take no responsibility for any action taken by them either. We strongly oppose this type of action, which will only put pressure on the students. “Furthermore, such action could give rise to friction between the teachers and the students,” he said.

 
Top to the page  |  E-mail  |  views[1]

 

Other News Articles
Govt. to spend billions for SAARC
Power crisis over CEB chief: Blackouts in several areas
Alleged suicide bomb director nabbed
Bomb detected on Kandy rail track
Lanka does not want the Queen sacked
Opposition parties to back call for media freedom
Lankan journalists forced to live in fear, says MP
Minister’s failure to appear before Commission amounts to ‘contempt’
Athas case: Time allowed for both counsel to appeal
Teachers divided on union action
Road under repair closed to heavy traffic
Speculation rife over visit of high-level Indian delegation
Ranil to meet Foreign Office minister during visit to Britain
Ban on oil guzzling vehicles proposed
East: Learning to live again
Temporary roadside structures to go
Lanka-India oil war blazes on
School lifts suspension order on minister’s son
Mihin’s debt burden threatens to bury it
Batti security beefed up
Odds and Ends
Student unrest leads to partial closure at two colleges
‘Human activity’ main cause of landslides
Ananda principal indicted on forgery charges
Poets join activists in chorus for Tamil cause
Playful pachyderm

 

 
Reproduction of articles permitted when used without any alterations to contents and a link to the source page.
© Copyright 2008 | Wijeya Newspapers Ltd.Colombo. Sri Lanka. All Rights Reserved.| Site best viewed in IE ver 6.0 @ 1024 x 768 resolution