Following the successful demonstration in Brussels on April 23, 2024, actions will take place in the various provinces in the week of May 7 to 15, 2024.
On Wednesday, May 15, 2024, the unions are organizing a demonstration in Ghent. The demonstration leaves at 10 am in the Citadel Park in Ghent. The route of the demonstration can be found here. The end is scheduled for around 12 noon in the Zuidpark.
The intention of these various demonstrations and actions is to make us as a sector heard with one voice for the June elections. Because the problems in education are broadly the same, across the language border and across the boundaries of the educational levels: structural underfunding, high workload, and a whole series of reforms in which education staff are not heard.
More concrete information (in Dutch) about recent developments in compulsory education can be found here.
Higher education is confronted with similar problems, including at Ghent University: recent years have been dominated by heavy cuts and top-down reforms. The recent well-being survey showed that the workload for all staff categories is very high, and that there is little prospect of improvement. It is therefore important that we also make our voice heard in these actions.
In addition, we, as members of the UGent community, also have other strong arguments for showing solidarity with colleagues from the other education levels: as parents who want quality education for their children, as people who are responsible for the quality training of tomorrow's teachers, as experts by experience about the negative consequences of envelope funding as it has been abused as a budget reduction instrument in higher education for decades now, and as people who are aware of the dangers of extensive so-called "autonomy" and the arbitrariness that accompanies it.
ACOD UGent therefore calls on all UGent staff members to participate in this demonstration!
Practical
A strike notice applies to all employees at Ghent University. Please note: this strike notice is specifically intended to give staff members the opportunity to go to the demonstration. Members of ACOD who are striking and participating in the demonstration can apply for strike compensation if Ghent University has withheld your wages for that day. For this purpose, you can send us the pay slip on which the deduction of wages due to strike is charged by email to ACOD@UGent.be. The strike compensation for a full day's loss of wages is 40 euros.
The demonstration will leave at 10 am at the kiosk in the Citadel Park in Ghent, and will end around 12 noon at the Zuidpark (see roadmap of the manifestation here).
We hope for your massive turnout!