Programs - Round Table

Lev Roitman:

On January 27-29, the All-Russian three-day teacher of teachers is scheduled. In many regions of Russia, especially in rural schools, strikes have already begun. There are areas, unfortunately, there are many of them, where the average teacher salary is not higher than the beggarly five hundred rubles, but they don’t pay this, they don’t pay in some places for almost a year. Teachers are striking - children suffer. Does the teacher have moral law (legal) to a strike? Here is the opinion of a Muscovite from a mini -question, which was held by Marina Katys on the eve of the program, our Moscow correspondent:

" I believe that the Russian teacher is unconditionally has the right to strike. Everyone has the right to a normal worthy life here and now, therefore, if teachers suddenly have been on the 11th grades, then this circumstance is in the lives of schoolchildren of 11 grades, and their teachers do not pay salaries, and they must finally pay it."

The opinion of the Muscovite.

Russian teachers are preparing for the All -Russian strike. Here's about teaching problems our conversation today. Participated, the participants gathered in our Moscow studio, Nikolai Alekseevich Kolabashkin - Deputy Chairman of the Trade Union of People's Education and Science of Russia; Kirill Kobrin - Associate Professor of the Nizhny Novgorod Pedagogical University; And with them, Marina Katys is our Moscow correspondent; And by telephone, our correspondent Dmitry Filatov participates in the program. Nikolai Alekseevich Kolabashkin, on Friday last week, January 15th, in the State Duma, Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian government Valentina Matvienko called for the outlined strike of teachers, in her opinion, it does not help solve the problem of non-payments. Your position, trade union?

Nikolai Kolabashkin:

Indeed, on Friday there was a government hour in the State Duma, the Deputy Prime Minister of the government participated and in the same meeting was participated by the chairman of our trade union Yakovlev. What can I say: the decision on the strike was made at the very end of last year, by that time in the vast majority of the regions of the country of the teacher, as already mentioned in the introduction, they did not even receive their really beggarly wages. But it’s enough to say that in central Russia, the wages of an employee of education are about 300-500 rubles per month, we all understand that this is terrible. So people do not even receive this beggarly money. Therefore, at the end of the year, at a meeting of the leading body of the trade union, it was decided to hold the All-Russian strike on January 27-29. Tomorrow we will have the next meeting of the governing body, and the final decision will be made: whether it will be an all -Russian strike or it will be a strike in the regions, supported by all of Russia. What I have to say on this strike: we understand the efforts of the federal government, it really is now doing everything possible in his power to somehow soften the situation in order to somehow pay the giant debt, formed not only in education, but also in the entire budget sphere. But, on the other hand, we are faced with a situation where, in the vast majority of regions, the local authorities, softly, can say so, a little indifferent to this issue, does not make, we believe, enough efforts to somehow extinguish this situation so that people get at least some money. Therefore, this action, its requirements will be addressed, first of all, to the local authorities, to the local administration, so that they, for their part, make these efforts.

Lev Roitman:

Thank you very much, Nikolai Alekseevich. Now in Vologda to our correspondent Dmitry Filatov. Dmitry, some incredible messages came from Vologda in general: there, on January 11 in the Shaksninsky district, teachers literally took the head of the district Vladimir Bukhonin as hostages and did not let him out of the district administration building, there were still several local officials with him. Does your special drama have this situation of non -payments to teachers?

Dmitry Filatov:

I can’t say anything concrete about special drama, since I do not know the situation in other regions of the country. But for example, the average monthly fund that the regional administration owed its state employees is about a month and a half. There are neighboring regions, where the debt on average monthly wages funds is 4-5 months, that is, we can say that we are not very complicated, but this is again, as in that joke about the average temperature throughout the hospital. For example, today the debt to teachers is about 130 million rubles, this is to the teachers of the region, in some areas they have not seen salaries for 3-4 months. But probably, the accustomed rural teachers could also be patient, but this year, as luck would have it, there was no potato on the Vologda region, so the villagers really have very difficult. As for the emergency in the Shaksninsky district of the Vologda region, really such a fact took place, but the routine, in general, the course of the strike with pickets, did not do without this emergency. On Monday, January 11th, the head of the Shaksninsky district, Vladimir Bukhonin, informed me on the phone that the teachers took him hostage, and if he did not pay the salary, then "I will be thrown out of the window." Subsequently, this information was transmitted by almost all information agencies, then, as it turned out, Vladimir Dmitrievich Bukhonin about the window said as if jokingly, but, nevertheless, this joke was picked up, replicated by the media, the correspondent of the French newspaper Figaro had already come to Shaksna, and reporters from Germany were on Thursday, according to my data, they work in Shaksna. Television men from Denmark, the Shaksninsky head, by the way, is an active supporter of the Communist Party, but, as it turned out, with a joke about the window, he achieved his own: now everyone sees that the current government does not possess the situation. But the situation begins to return to normal, payments on salaries in the areas have begun, and now the number of teachers of the striking is gradually reduced: on Thursday, about 4.5 thousand people have been basst, and today the data was 3700 people.

Lev Roitman:

Thank you, Dmitry Filatov, Vologda. Well, the head of the district administration in the Sheksninsky district, with his statement about his window, obviously achieved him, one way or another, was released from the administration building on the same day at 8 pm. But, as it seems, and the teachers are gradually achieving a little, nevertheless you say that some payments have begun. Now again to Moscow to Kirill Kobrin, I will remind you: Associate Professor of the Nizhny Novgorod Pedagogical University. Cyril, how do you set up your pets, and your pets, as far as I know from what you told me before the start of our program, is it mainly main teachers of rural schools, how to sow rational, kind, eternal without wages?

Kirill Kobrin:

You know, indeed, among my absentants, most are teachers of rural schools. But you know, this problem is much harder than it seems at first glance. It seems to be worse than non -payment of salaries? And you can generally nod to the crisis, and says that in the crisis what teachers are there, what kind of money is there when everything is collapsing. But continuing the tragicomic theme related to the window and the local official, I will remember the same rather comic situation that happened in America during the Great Depression: in the 32nd year, New York, a terrible situation, no one has money, work, a stranger enters the cafe where writers are sitting, journalists and sees that they are sitting calmly, they talk, they talk, no panic No, and he knows for sure that they are all without work, he asks: “Gentlemen, excuse me, and what do you drink and in general what do you live for?”, To which one of them proudly replies: “And we marry the teachers.” The fact is that in New York in the 32nd year, despite the "great depression", the teachers were one of the highest paid professions. So, returning to our native problems, I want to say that the point is not that there is no money in the budget, but the fact is that the situation itself is systemically bad: the normal reform of the public education system was not carried out, no normal school reform was carried out, nothing was done. Indeed, on the one hand, of course, to not pay teachers a salary is a terrible and great sin, but, excuse me, do not give schools money so that they buy new textbooks, benefits and all these poor nightmares, which you have never come to the last 10 years. I am a historian by profession, if you can teach children according to the old textbooks of mathematics, because mathematics somehow does not change, then, sorry, new textbooks must be introduced, otherwise we see, before our eyes, the second generation of young people who do not know their own or foreign ones grow before our eyes. Therefore, this situation is vicious not only because teachers are not given a salary, but it is also vicious because teachers are not allowed to work normally, they do not allow us to normally engage in self -improvement, improving their programs and so on, and so on. And as a result, you see, this is not the law of the jungle, where the strongest, unfortunately, wins in medicine, in education in such crisis situations, unfortunately, most often do not remain the best. Therefore, maybe I will say a harshly, but the quality of teachers and my, respectively, students' students over the past few years began to simply fall sharply.

Lev Roitman:

Thank you, I want to turn on a fragment from a mini -request Marina Katys - a Muscovite who believes that teachers are right to a strike, moral law, in any case, do not:

" The children they teach, they do not receive the education that they should receive. They do not end the 11th grade there, the 10th, they can be late for a year, and after that they already have less chance of getting the work that they would like to get a job for. The teachers, in principle, should think not only about themselves, but also about the people who, in principle, will be their future, about their children. If they choose the government that would like to, and they would like them and they would like them. They paid a salary, then maybe everything would be different, but they chose the government that is now. "

The opinion of the Muscovite. Nikolai Alekseevich, you are a line for commentary.

Nikolai Kolabashkin:

Listening to this Muscovite, purely morally, I can understand her - it is of course difficult for us, for many it is not clear how a teacher may not come to school and not conduct classes. But let this Muscovite try to understand the teachers. Moscow may not have encountered such problems that other regions of the country face. But, in general, I can say that to those teachers who do not go to strikes, they just need to erect a monument, not to mention those who enter the strike. A person who receives such pennies, he carries knowledge to the future generation, in essence he prepares the future of our country, because without education, I do not know what future is destined for us. Of course, it is possible to understand her purely morally to some extent, but I must say that the last actions that the teachers held were held, we get more and more support for parents. Parents understand that a teacher without money, a teacher who, in order to earn extra money, takes additional lessons, takes some work on the side, he, of course, will in no case give qualitative knowledge to the student. That is, this is a problem, one might say, not only family, it is a problem of the whole nation. Therefore, I remain with my opinion that the teacher has a full moral right, living in this position, go to the strike and demand the fulfillment of his legal rights.

Lev Roitman:

Thank you, Nikolai Alekseevich. And I add, you say: “I remain with my opinion” that you are the deputy chairman of the trade union of public education workers, so I believe that you are expressing the position of your trade union organization. Marina Katys, you, in addition to the fact that our Moscow correspondent, who held his mini -sleeping of Muscovites (we chose only two votes from this extensive sentence that you sent to us), but you, in addition, are the mother, so to speak, a high school student, you are a line.

Marina Katys:

But I think that there are two points in the problem of strikes by teachers: firstly, I really don’t know where people can work for a year without getting salaries for a year, and I don’t think that there are analogues of such phenomena in world practice, when people do not receive salaries for a year, but they fulfill their official duties, do not receive a salary for half a year, and then they begin to pay this salary. But there is a second point - this salary, in particular, should pay not only the federal authorities, but part of this salary comes from the local budget, both local authorities and the federal government, indeed, the teachers themselves. And probably, part of the responsibility for what is happening is still on those people who voted, and once went to the urns, not quite, nevertheless, realizing what is happening. If the people choose a government, which then allows themselves to treat this people like this, then, probably, part of the fault lies in the very people.

Lev Roitman:

Thank you, Marina Katys. Well, the government, as such, still does not choose, the government is appointed president and choose, nevertheless, deputies of the State Duma and the President. Be that as it may, Kirill Kobrin, when such unusual calendar terms do not pay the salary - six months, sometimes a year, 3 months - like the norm, it suddenly turns out that in life, they say, in general, and in the life of a teacher, there is a place for a feat for a feat.

Kirill Kobrin:

But, you know, in fact, people who work for free, this is always something in general anomalous in fact for a human normal society. But on the other hand, I would like to look at this problem a little deeper, and as a historian to give some historical perspective. You know, in Russia they always paid little teachers, so I recall Vasily Vasilyevich Rozanov, a famous Russian philosopher and writer, when he worked as a teacher, he went to school barefoot, because he did not have money for boots. In essence, even then the Russian teacher behaved heroically in some way, I am not sure, of course, that Rozanov was a good teacher, but nevertheless. Therefore, of course, when a person graduates, suppose, a pedagogical institute and agrees to work in the specialty, already in the very fact of this choice, no matter how additional mercantile interests this decision is not accompanied, this is already a decision that should be respected, and which, in general, is certainly almost heroic, especially in our country. And when, having made this heroic decision, a person begins to work and does not pay him these pennies, not 500, obviously, a normal teacher receives when he comes to school only, but 300, and then at best, if he does not take on a huge number of hours, then in general, he does not doze off his poverty in any case, that he is not paid to the salary, that he does not pay this salaries and so on. So, of course, in the school, as well as in the medical, as it seems to me, such an element of heroism and feat was originally laid in our country. Another thing is that now this element is reduced, sorry, to such just suicide actually financial and which one, because even this salary is not paid a small salary. Therefore, it seems to me that returning to the main topic of our transfer, about the moral right of the teacher, of course, the teacher, like any hired employee, is obliged, as it seems to me, it is obliged to strike, if they do not pay wages.

Lev Roitman:

Thank you, Kirill Kobrin. Well, I can only recall literary sources, as soon as we are talking about income, salaries of a pre -revolutionary teacher. Anyone who recalls "lonely sail ..." Kataev and Bachey, the father, Bachey Sr., father of Petya Bachey, who was a teacher of the gymnasium, will remember that they lived quite with dignity and even went abroad. Well, of course, if you recall Ani's father from the Chekhov’s “Anna on the neck”, who was also a drawing teacher in the gymnasium, then he washed down, and this was already enough for the children to be in the position of the poor and go almost barefoot, like you, Kirill, say that the testimonies are different. Probably, salaries were enough, but not for everything.

Nikolai Kolabashkin:

What can I say in conclusion: literally every other day we will know for sure whether the bulk of the members of our trade union will come out, that is, education workers, for a strike or not. Now we are already receiving information, today, I even grabbed such a certificate with me, have already received reports that somewhere about 700 thousand workers today, as my son says, confirmed at 100% that they would go to this strike. What the numbers will be closer to the 27th number, we will see, because some steps are visible now, some are still made, perhaps payments, but nevertheless, we still finally solve the issue with this strike. Необходимо чтобы и Федеральное правительство, местные власти все же реально обратились к этой проблеме, мы как-то должны выходить из этого в общем-то постыдного положения, когда работники, я думаю, вы все согласитесь, действительно одной из самых благородных профессий, находятся в таком униженном положении. Мы все же глубоко надеемся и своими акциями будем всячески подталкивать власти к решению этого вопроса.