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Part of the educators called for the continuation of the suspension of classes, but what are the plans to make up for the missed material?
The school year is officially underway, but not in all primary and secondary schools in Serbia, as it is part of educational workers still in suspend classes.
According to the data School associations on strike, about 500 schools in Serbia are in complete suspension, while in about 400 some teachers are holding classes of half an hour.
"Based on the data we managed to collect, that is more than half of the schools in Serbia." We don't have data for all schools, but based on what we have, more than 15.000 teachers are on strike, and close to 10.000 work for 30 minutes," Vinić told "Vreme".
While waiting for the further development of the situation, educators are also thinking about how the teaching will be compensated.
"So far we don't have concrete plans, and each teacher needs to adjust the material and summarize the lessons for himself and how he will make up for the material through the number of classes that are left, along with the classes that will be added as make-up classes," says Vinić.
As this technical and informatics teacher at an elementary school in Čačak adds, educators are enthusiastic and will give maximum energy and effort to make up for everything that was missed in the period that we have left until the end of the school year.
"Certainly, everyone will do their best to ensure that the children are not harmed," says Vinić.
Plans upon fulfillment of student requirements
In a letter that appeared on social networks, Ivan Kalinić, an English teacher at the "Nikola Tesla" Secondary Technical School in Sremska Mitrovica, stated that he will begin compensating classes for February 2025, the day after all student requirements are met.
"The day on which all student demands will be fulfilled will be a holiday, and from the next day I will teach 14 hours a day, with my head held high and a clean face," states Kalinic in the letter.
Emperor and king! pic.twitter.com/G7YB2BCEtu
— Aleksandar Karisik (@SasaKarisik) February 27, 2025
Teachers from Belgrade grammar schools, on the other hand, decided not to make any plans, because, as Katarina Šćepanović Ostojić, a teacher at the Philological Grammar School and a member of the Forum of Belgrade Grammar Schools, says, "it is not within our jurisdiction."
"We have decided together, as a collective, that we will not provide compensation plans," says Katarina Šćepanović Ostojić for "Vreme".
According to him, classes are not held in any other gymnasium in the capital of Serbia, except partially in the First Belgrade High School.
"There are people who have declared that they are working, but they don't have pupils. It's funny, like in a movie," she says.
New call for suspension
Although it was announced that they would wages for February will be calculated according to performance - the more they worked, the more they will earn, the part of educators who suspended classes is firm in their position that there is no return to the classrooms until the demands are met.
"As the United Education of Serbia, at the meeting held on Thursday, we agreed to call for a strike next week as well, to make it even more massive and to invite other institutions, members of other branches to join in the strike, any form of strike that is possible, to try together to initiate changes," says Aleksandar Vinić.
As expressed by the United Education of Serbia, an organization that unites informal groups of educators with the aim of supporting students and working together in education, "given the fact that the demands of educators have not yet been met, that the competent institutions are not able to ensure safe and continuous teaching in schools, as well as that the pressures on teachers are becoming greater and more frequent, we call on the educators of Serbia to suspend classes from March 3 to 7 in 2025".
The statement adds that the United Education of Serbia joins the initiative of the students of the University of Novi Sad and calls on all citizens to join the "general strike" on Friday, March 7.
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