Peregraf- Ravyar Abubakr
In Sulaimaniyah, a child in the fourth grade struggles with a sentence that a child from Erbil would be able to read and write correctly.
To show the difference, Peregraf wrote a simple sentence and asked a child in the fourth grade in a Sulaymaniyah school to read it and then rewrite it. It took him significant amount of time to read the sentence and at times, the student needed to sound out the letters. In addition, he made spelling and grammatical errors in rewriting the sentence.
In the same experiment, a student in the fourth grade in Erbil was able to read the same sentence correctly and rapidly and rewrite it without a mistake.
This Peregraf investigation found that the difference in comprehension and learning levels between Sulaymaniyah and Erbil students is related to the governance in the Kurdistan Region. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), citing the financial crisis, has been unable to pay salaries on time, resulting in strikes affecting the majority of schools in Sulaymaniyah governorate.
For six years, most schools in the governorates of Sulaymaniyah and Halabja, as well as in the independent administrations of Garmian and Raparin (areas under the control of The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and Gorran Movement) called a strike which lasted for nearly half of the school year in each of those years. Meanwhile, in Erbil, Duhok and areas under Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) authority, schooling has continued.
Azhi Kawa is a fourth grade student in a school in Sulaymaniyah’s Sharazoor town. He is one of the victims of the educational crisis and the strikes in the area.
“The schools have not opened for several years as they are supposed to. Even though we have put forth a great effort with [Azhi], it is not enough,” Azhi’s mother Gulala Muhammad told Peregraf.
According to his parents, Azhi is not proficient in reading and writing. He struggles to recognize the letters and even needs to sound out each of the letters while reading the signs on local storefronts.
The educational sector’s employees began to strike in 2014 when the KRG announced the “salary savings system,” the government’s name for an austerity program which mandates temporary salary cuts along with contributions to an account for civil servants’ back pay as oil prices increase. But the government still cannot afford to pay salaries on time, even after making cuts.
Now the majority of children who started school in 2014 and who are currently in the sixth grade have lost months of schooling as a result of the strikes.
Azhi is not as passionate about school as he was before because the time he spends away from school exceeds the amount of time he is in the classroom. He told Peregraf that now he prefers to stay at home and play.
His father is a public employee, and his mother is a housewife; they have been trying to fill the gap caused by the absence of school.
“What we teach him [at home] is nothing compared to what he was learning in the years he spent off-and-on in school,” said Azhi’s mother.
KRG Ministry of Education decided to start the school year on October 10, 2020 – the first and second grades study in physical classes and other grades study online. This decision has been fully implemented in Erbil and Duhok, but in Sulaymaniyah, Halabja, Garmian and Raparin the school doors remain closed and few are attending classes online.
Kawa Hama Saeed, Azhi’s father, has become increasingly concerned and says he says that he and his wife are confused. They do not have enough information about the new curriculum to try to teach their son some of the subjects on their own.
The teachers’ strike continues without a solution on the horizon for the teachers’ main demand for resuming teaching: a resolution to the problem of paying salaries.
Kamal Fatah, a Kurdish language teacher in Naway Nwe School in Sulaymaniyah, confirmed the negative impact of the educational crisis on students. He told Peregraf: “There are students who have reached the ninth grade but cannot properly read and write. It is a disaster that a student in grade nine is not capable of writing a composition in Kurdish without mistakes.”
Kamal sees the strike and resulting school closures as the most significant factor in students’ deteriorating performance.
In addition to this year’s strike, last year, half of school year was cancelled in accordance with health regulations implemented in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
“Children cannot learn as well from their parents as from teachers because for children, parents’ roles are different from those of teachers. But we were obliged to fill the education gap, even though we were sure it’s not good enough,” said Hawkar Ezat
Hawkar is the father of two children in a primary school in Sulaymaniyah. He and his wife have tried to compensate for their children’s absence from school.
Describing how they managed the previous school year, he told Peregraf: “Neither I nor their mother are professionals in teaching, so based on our knowledge and background, each took responsibility for a child’s learning and education parallel to their online learning.”
Online classes are now available for all grades except grades one, two and twelve. Students enter a username and password to access a website on which all subjects are available.
Dlshad Abdurahman, an expert in education and former Minister of Education, thinks that the resumption of schooling in Erbil and Duhok is attributable to political power and pressure, which is stronger in that area, and not because of the centralized enforcement of government regulations.
“Although teachers’ strikes have had significant adverse effects on students and on society in general, the government’s failure to meet teachers’ demands is the main reason for this situation in education.”
The circumstances of public employees, including teachers, are getting worse; they are paid a reduced salary every other month and the government owes them a significant amount of savings and back pay.
Rebaz Muhammad Jaza, a teacher at the Halabja Fine Arts Institute, does not fully support the strikes or returning to work full time. He says that strikes harm the students because they cannot study much of the curriculum on their own. “Teachers in Erbil and Duhok have their problems too and their salaries have been cut, but due to single-party hegemony, there have been fewer strikes and protests.”
According to the statistics Peregraf obtained from Kurdistan Teachers’ Union, the strikes have caused four thousand schools to shut their doors in areas that are home to one million students.
Ahmed Kerkuki, Media Manager and member of Teachers’ Union Secretariat, told Peregraf: “Students and teachers, even children of teachers, are the main victims of the current circumstances, but the primary cause is the KRG and it should find a solution itself.”
He says that according to statistics reported by the Ministry of Education, around 30 thousand students quit schooling each year due to absence from school and other problems.
Teachers’ Union rejects online and electronic teaching and says that teachers and faculty will not return to the classroom until its demands are met.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education has not yet officially announced a plan to respond to the teachers’ strike. Peregraf made several attempts to reach the Minister of Education and the ministry spokesperson, but they were not prepared to discuss the matter.
Ashna Abdulla, member of the Education Committee in Kurdistan Parliament, says that if the labor issues are dealt with responsibility, the immediate and long-term adverse effects of teachers’ strikes on students should also be discussed. She also told Peregraf that teachers’ demands are legitimate and they are left with no better option than to strike, “I consider the strike to be a civil solution to gain teachers’ rights.”
The teachers’ demands includes a disbursement of their savings and the payment of salaries in full every 30 days. But the KRG needs Baghdad’s help just to distribute cut salaries bi-monthly. Meanwhile Iraqi Federal Government is unable meet KRG demands and accrues debt just to cover the salaries of federal workers. Therefore the future of education is as unclear as the future of salaries.
This investigative report was written by Ravyar Abubakr for Peregraf as part of the Intensive Journalism Workshop funded by the German Foreign Office.