... or not. Neither students nor teachers are happy with the start of the academic year, reports Mona El-Nahhas The new academic year starts on Saturday, much to the chagrin of many families. There have been repeated appeals from the public to delay the beginning of the new term until after Eid Al-Fitr, the feast marking the end of Ramadan, but they have all been ignored, leaving already overstretched family budgets to cope not only with the additional expenses of the holy month but with those that come with the start of each academic year. The government refused to be swayed, insisting that school must begin on 20 September. Minister of Higher Education Hani Helal even argued that delaying the start of the academic year was in neither the spirit of Ramadan nor Islam, which values hard work. Minister of Education Yosri El-Gamal, meanwhile, said that reducing term time by delaying its start would lead to skimping on the curriculum. "Why do they insist on provoking the public's anger?" asks Adel Mustafa, a 35-year-old taxi driver. "What benefit will students get from going to school just a few days before the feast?" "Teachers will teach nothing. They will be preparing for the feast themselves," complains Magda Farouk, a 45-year-old house wife. She says that she will send her two children on the first day of the school year and then keep them at home for the rest of the week. "They will just go next Saturday to get their books. Then they will stay at home until the end of the feast." It is a ploy many parents may adopt. While students and parents are annoyed about the timing of the new school year, teachers have other reasons to be angry. So upset are they with the recently introduced system whereby they must sit examinations to qualify for bonuses that many teachers are threatening not to go to work on 20 September. They say the entire process -- the tests were held last month -- was humiliating. "I am not going to school on 20 September. A large number of my colleagues will do the same. This is the least we can do. Our demand is for a non-conditional pay increase and an annulment of this cadre system," says secondary school teacher Nagwa Ismail. Political groups, including Kifaya, and Internet activists have lent support to both teachers and students in their calls for a strike. "Beside the inconvenient timing of the new school year, we are protesting against the deteriorating level of education, the loss of teacher's dignity and against prices which have been rising daily," George Ishaq, Kifaya's media coordinator, told Al-Ahram Weekly. Ishaq called upon opposition parties and other political groups to support the call for the strike and send an unequivocal message to the government. Ishaq attaches great importance to such actions, arguing that without civil disobedience nothing will change. Calls for a strike have been repeated on Facebook, the social networking site that is increasingly being used as a tool for political mobilisation. The 6 April Youth Movement was the first to use Facebook to urge the public to take action against deteriorating living conditions, urging a widespread campaign of civil disobedience last April. They repeated calls for a general strike on 4 May, though any mass response was preempted when, on Labour Day, 1 May, President Hosni Mubarak announced a 30 per cent increase in basic rates of pay for all state employees. Ahmed Maher, a leading member of the 6 April Movement, told the Weekly he hoped the 20 September strike will be a success.
