Yucatan teachers protest against the return to face-to-face classes

Mérida, Yucatán, (August 28, 2021) .- Basic education teachers, aboard their vehicles, protested around the Yucatan Ministry of Education against the return to face-to-face classes announced for this Monday, August 30.

The protesters gathered at the La Inalámbrica sports facility and in a caravan, shouting and sounding their horns, headed for the state-building, causing vehicular chaos.

To make the protest more conspicuous, from their cars they displayed banners rejecting face-to-face classes, others preferred to stick the posters on the doors and windows of their vehicles:

“If 90% of public schools are ready for safe return, we invite the authorities of Yucatán and the SEP to set an example by sending their children to a public school this year,” read a poster.

The complaints were numerous, there were even those who demanded a second dose of the Cansino vaccine against Covid-19 for teachers.

“We do not want to return to face-to-face classes! Health is first. We need Remote Classes”, said the poster of the teacher Adriana Segovia, a pre-school teacher.

From her vehicle, the teacher Adriana Segovia said that to return to the classrooms has to be banned, to make sure that the children will not get sick.

“Are the parents aware of how difficult it will be to have the children sitting for three or four hours at school without being able to interact? It is highly preferable that children stay at home than being at school and with the risk of taking off their masks, ”she pointed out.

The teacher added that the main demand is that the right to health of children, teachers, and families be respected.

After half an hour of walking around the education headquarters and surrounding streets, a delegation of ten teachers entered the offices of the State Secretary of Education, Liborio Vidal Aguilar, to talk.

Professor Víctor Manuel Enríquez Cabrera, a primary school teacher, was one of the ten men who entered the headquarters. Addressed before entering, he told the media that the main requirement is that the classes are not face-to-face.

Enríquez Cabrera added that the right to education for children is below the right to health in the Constitution. “There is health, there is education. There is no health, there is no education ”.

They have consulted the parents and 95% said they do not want face-to-face classes, said the teacher.

Enríquez Cabrera assured that of the 30,000 basic education teachers, 85% do not want to return to face-to-face classes.

After the entourage entered the offices, the other teachers stood outside displaying posters with the legends: “Segey, I don’t want courses, I want resources”, “No to face-to-face classes without safe spaces” and “Constitutional Article 4: Guarantee for all people the right to health protection ”.

Meanwhile, in the surroundings of the Ministry of Education a traffic jam was generated.

Source: Diario de Yucatan