Lecturers strike despite increased funding

“As Valérie Pécresse, Minister for Higher Education and Research, was last week announcing a €731 million economic boost to the sector, lecturers at universities throughout France were intensifying strike action against a planned change to the statute governing their employment. The ‘national coordination of higher education and research’ consisting of unions and other associations representing protesting academics had called for the strike to start last Monday. That afternoon nearly 400 academics, including delegates mandated by their universities, attended a meeting at the Sorbonne in Paris where a vote confirmed the call for ‘an unlimited and general strike’. During the week, staff at universities throughout the country organised general meetings to vote on protest action against Pécresse’s proposals to make their conditions of work more ‘flexible’ …” (more)

[Jane Marshall, University World News, 8 February]