The Network of Academic Solidarity and Engagement (MASA) condemns the spontaneous and ad-hoc decision-making on the sudden and abrupt end of the current school year, two weeks before the planned end. Such decisions are particularly harmful in crisis situations, when most people need security and a relatively predictable, organized near future. The sudden end of the school year brings with it enormous organizational problems, both in relation to the curriculum and assessment, as well as in the private lives of the families of students and teachers. One of the skills that students acquire during the educational process is the importance of planning and organizing, in connection with following classes, learning, and acquiring work habits. Spontaneous decision-making by the top of the state that changes the plans of all participants in the educational process is completely contrary to what we are trying to teach students. Just as great damage has been done to the education system over the years by not following the five-year educational development plan and by introducing sudden changes unrelated to that plan, such as dual education, so is the sudden interruption of the school year causing damage.
The method of informing teachers and students about this decision is particularly worrying, since most of them learned about it from the media, and only later received an official announcement. It is scandalous for the state administration that an important and great system, such as education, drastically and suddenly changes its plan, and that students and teachers learn about it from the media. We remind you that the decision to end the school year on June 6 (Tuesday) was announced in the media on June 1 (Thursday) and officially forwarded to school principals on June 2 (Friday), which leaves only 2 or at best 3 working days for teachers and students to complete all duties and complete the curriculum. All of the above testifies to the haste and unprofessionalism of the decision to end the school year.
MASA demands that the date and minutes of the session of the Ministry of Education, where the decision to end the school year was made, be published. To publish on whose proposal the mentioned decision was made and what are the arguments for that decision. This is very important so that we all have an insight into the decision-making process and see its consequences together.
In addition, MASA invites all school employees, students as well as their parents, to oppose the decision made and to demand that school activities be completed within the planned period, in an organized and orderly manner. If nothing else, it is important to point out to the decision-makers in the government, and especially to our students, the importance of planning and institutions for the functioning of a well-ordered society, as well as the importance of personal responsibility and integrity in confronting bad, socially disastrous decisions, by whomever they were coming.
