How Mexican teachers unions are pushing the presidential frontrunner left | Salon.com

How Mexican teachers unions are pushing the presidential frontrunner left | Salon.com:

How Mexican teachers unions are pushing the presidential frontrunner left

López Obrador is signaling his support for the thousands of communities fighting privatization across Mexico

This article originally appeared in In These Times

As Mexico moves closer to the July 1 Presidential election, candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador (commonly referred to AMLO) is signaling his support for the thousands of communities fighting privatization across Mexico. López Obrador hails from the Juntos Haremos Historia coalition — a center-left coalition of National Regeneration Movement Party, The Labor Party and the Social Encounter Party. He is the former mayor of Mexico City and widely considered to be the frontrunner. López Obrador has found a significant ally in the Oaxacan teachers of Sección XXII, who are pushing the candidate to take a more left-leaning position on privatization and reject controversial education reforms.

On May 12, López Obrador announced in a speech in Puebla that he rejects privatization programs of previous administrations. "Privatization policies are over,” he declared. “Water will not be privatized; health services will not be privatized.”

 Among the privatization efforts he focused on were the education reforms passed by Enrique Pena Nieto, calling the measures “a humiliation of the teachers.” López Obrador announced in mid-May that he would end the education reform.

The announcement represents the culmination of resistance to the controversial reforms, according to the teachers of Oaxaca’s Sección 22 of the National Union of Education Workers (Sindicato Nacional de Trabajadores de la Educación, or SNTE) and The National Coordinator of Education Workers (Coordinadora Nacional de Trabajadores de la Educación, or CNTE).

The teachers' decision to pursue an agreement with the López Obrador was made in Februaryduring the V Political Congress of Sección XXII. Eloy López Hernández, Sección XXII’s General Secretary, announced the decision “to influence this electoral situation by orienting the conscious and reasoned vote towards the bases, to the parents of family and society in general, to being guarantors of the popular will in favor of the alternative project of nation" that López Obrador's campaign represents. Carlos Barriosa, a member the political section of Sección XXII, is using a Continue reading: How Mexican teachers unions are pushing the presidential frontrunner left | Salon.com:

Gates Foundation launches a new global education strategy | Devex

Gates Foundation launches a new global education strategy | Devex:

Gates Foundation launches a new global education strategy

SAN FRANCISCO — On Friday, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation launched its global education strategy, to provide education systems in India and sub-Saharan Africa with better resources to improve teaching and learning.

Building on its investments in global health and international development, and expanding its work on education beyond the United States, the new global effort has a $68 million budget for the next four years.

In a blog post announcing the strategy, Girindre Beeharry, director of global education at the Gates Foundation, notes the progress the world has made on education over the past 15 years, but explains that expanded access has not translated to better outcomes.

“What we’re trying to do here is stay with the problem a bit longer, as opposed to going to a solution mode,” he told Devex ahead of the announcement. “Instead of saying, ‘This is the answer,’ we are trying to say: ‘It is likely that every country will need to find its own path in solving the education problem.’”

 The strategy has four pillars: At the classroom level, the foundation will identify cost-effective approaches to supporting teaching and learning; it will work with partners to assess the causes of poor performance and identify solutions best suited to those needs; it will support efforts to make data on learning outcomes comparable across countries so progress can be tracked over time; and it will seek to understand barriers holding girls back.

Millions of children in school are learning very little, which emphasizes the point that attendance and learning are separate challenges, Beeharry wrote in the blog post.

“Leaving these students behind amplifies inequality, as the learning deficiency is largest among the poor,” he continued in the post. “The learning deficit is also at the root of what worries many governments: A poorly skilled youth population.”

Traditionally, the Gates Foundation’s work on education has been limited to the United States, though Bill Gates, billionaire co-chair of the Gates Foundation, has personally supported education beyond U.S. borders through some of his investments.

Gates, who along with his wife and fellow foundation co-chair Melinda Gates, Continue reading: Gates Foundation launches a new global education strategy | Devex: