Emergency treatment was filed by the Minister of Education, Niki Kerameos, against the Teachers’ Federation (DOE), the Federation of Secondary Education Teachers (OLME), the Panhellenic Federation of Associations of Special Education Personnel (POSEEPA), and the Federation of Private School Teachers of Greece (OIELE) before the Single-Judge Court of First Instance of Athens, requesting that the «strike»strike-boycott" aimed at preventing the implementation of the law passed by the Hellenic Parliament regarding the evaluation of schools and educational work be declared illegal and abusive.
The lawsuit will be heard today, Thursday, due to the urgency of the matter, in accordance with the statutory deadlines for the various stages of the review process.
«The Federations opposed any concept of evaluation from the outset, even before the passage of Law 4692/2020 on the evaluation of schools and educational work, as well as Law 4823/2021 on the evaluation of education administrators, teachers, and members of the Special Education and Special Support Staff. And following the passage of these laws, the teachers« union leadership is calling on their colleagues to violate them—and indeed to go on a—a work stoppage of indefinite duration—from any action related to an improved evaluation process aimed at comprehensively upgrading the quality of education provided. Moreover, it has now become standard practice for these organizations to declare a »strike or work stoppage» against any procedure legislated by the Hellenic Parliament that simply does not suit their preferences, such as, for example, yesterday’s announcement by OLME of a strike-boycott even against distance learning in cases where, for objective reasons, in-person instruction is not possible (e.g., when students« access to the school premises is blocked),» states the Ministry of Education in a press release, calling for the indefinite “strike and boycott” to be deemed illegal and abusive and for state law to be enforced.
«We firmly believe that these decisions by the teachers» union leadership do not represent the teaching community, the overwhelming majority of whom carry out their duties with consistency and a sincere desire for continuous improvement, for the benefit of the entire educational community,” the statement in question concludes.
