SADTU to picket outside Pearson Lillian Selapisa, The New Age, Johannesburg, 29 April 2016 The South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) will today be picketing outside the Cape Town company accused of hampering free education, in solidarity with unions and educationists across the globe. According to the union, the picket will coincide with the board meeting of Pearson PLC in London to challenge the company's business strategy and stop its project of commercialising and privatising education at all levels. Pearson is a publishing company which provides learning solutions from early childhood to professional certification. The company has a presence in more than 70 countries. Pearson Southern Africa operates in 11 countries in sub-Saharan Africa and publishes in more than 58 African languages. The union said in an effort to expand and increase profits, Pearson PLC was turning its back on free public education for all. This was evident in the company's activities around the world. SADTU provincial secretary Jonavon Rustin said Pearson's efforts to make education a commodity to be bought and sold in the global south was a serious threat to democracy and would ultimately increase segregation and marginalisation. "From fuelling the obsessive testing regimes that are the backbone of the test and punish efforts in the global north, to supporting the predatory, low-fee for-profit private schools in the global south, Pearson's brand has become synonymous with profiteering and the destruction of public education," Rustin said. "By supporting the expansion of low-fee private schooling and other competitive practices, Pearson is essentially ensuring that a large number of the world's most vulnerable children have no hope of receiving free, quality education." SADTU said access to education was a fundamental human right and should not be based on a family's ability to pay. Pearson SA said it would get back to The New Age but had not done so at the time of going to print. [email protected] From: http://tnaepaper.co.za/DRIVE/main%20edition/29042016/epaperpdf/2.pdf -- -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "YCLSA Discussion Forum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
