Mexican Teacher Union Officials Sanction Taking Hostages

Mexican teacher union officials commanded student teachers to take hostages to show their displeasure at attempts to introduce some education reforms.  Anastasia O’Grady has the story in the Wall street Journal.

Accountability is a foreign concept for many who go into teaching, which explains why teaching students are part of the rebellion. In April, violence broke out in Chilpancingo, the state capital of Guerrero, when the state legislature refused a request by activists to reject the new evaluation process. Union thugs vandalized property. They also blocked the highway that runs from Mexico City, through Chilpancingo, to Acapulco, with serious economic consequences. Most teachers unions at least pretend to care about their students. Many striking teachers in Mexico just walked off the job, leaving children and parents in the lurch.

. . . Mexicanos Primero reports that Guerrero, Oaxaca and Michoácan, where much of the union violence has taken place, have the nation’s worst secondary-education outcomes.

Notes Mr. González: “No country in the OECD spends as much on education, as a percentage of GDP, as Mexico. Still, we have no reliable registry of teachers and close to 160,000 people [are paid] a salary as teachers but never step into a classroom.”