With the threat of a university strike looming only three days away - this Sunday - Finance Ministry officials and university heads managed to reach a compromise late Thursday night, and the universities will, in fact, be open. However, the Professors Union is still holding out for increased wages, and it is possible that the teachers will not show up for classes on the first day of the new semester.
The Committee of University Presidents had said it would shut down the campuses and delay the opening of the school year if the Finance Ministry did not come through with an additional 300 million shekels. In the end, they agreed to accept 150 million shekels, with a possible 50 million more in the future.
Representatives of the professors were to convene on Friday to decide if to accept an offer to hold off on a strike while negotiations continue in parallel. The lecturers have been working without a collective wage agreement for the past six years.
University studies face a threat from a third direction as well, with students threatening to resume their own strike if the decision is made to increase tuition by 70%. The increase is one of the controversial Shochat Committee reforms, and is set to be approved this coming January.
High School Teachers’ Walkout Enters Second Week
Meanwhile, high schools students across the country continue to be locked out of the classrooms by striking teachers, who are protesting the lack of a wage agreement with the government. A meeting on Thursday evening between government officials and teachers' representatives was termed "positive," but led to no practical results.
The strike entered its second week on Wednesday, with teachers in the Arab sector joining the walkout. Schools in the Arab sector had not been closed earlier in respect for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which ended last Friday.
Schools in Sderot and other Gaza belt communities have been exempted from the strike, due to security concerns. Parents and teachers alike appealed to union officials not to close the schools, explaining the children were safer in the classrooms than out on the street where they could be exposed to Kassam rocket attacks.
Secondary School Teachers Association head Ron Erez says the teachers are demanding a 15% wage hike - reduced from their original demand for a 20% pay raise - as well as an improvement in working conditions. Talks with the Finance and Education ministries have continued off and on for weeks, with little progress. Officials are not optimistic about the chances of the strike ending any time soon.
Rabbi Cherlow: The Public Must Back the Teachers
Rabbi Yuval Cherlow, head of the Petach Tikvah Yeshivat Hesder, told Arutz-7's Hebrew newsmagazine on Thursday that the strike must be seen not only as a struggle for money, but "as an attempt to increase the level of education in Israel."
A founding member of the Tzohar Rabbis Organization, the rabbi said that the strike is designed to "encourage excellence among the teachers, improve teaching conditions and education, and the like. In the end, this will benefit the entire Israeli public, and not just the teachers. Therefore, the entire public must support the teachers in their demands."
Regarding the Torah obligation not to call of Torah studies, Rabbi Cherlow said, "This is a problem that occupies the religious teachers every day. I propose an arrangement whereby the teachers will teach material that is not part of the matriculation curriculum, so that they will not hurt the strike but will also not cause bitul Torah [the abrogation of Torah study]."
Haifa Open Facilities for High School Students During Strike
The city of Haifa has decided to take steps to ensure its 20,000 high school students are not left to wander the streets in the absence of daily lessons. Using teachers from the non-striking Histadrut Teachers Union, it is trying to arrange regular studies for the minority of students who appear willing to come - though not with great success. The teachers explain that they are not strike-breaking, but protesting statements made by Erez against Haifa's educational system.
Haifa Mayor Yona Yahav told reporters, “We will not leave the children outside to hang around all day.” Erez said that Yahav was :slapping the teachers in the face and spitting in their faces at the same time."