2011 Chilean Student Movement in the world

[Molina!]

In Chile and met 3 months of student demonstrations, which even now can say that is a social movement for adhesion which has been part of various social actors, as workers, citizens themselves.

I'm interested to know how is this movement (which has now certainly been progress towards a political movement) in the world.

Questions, comments, opinions, reflections ... Please post it

[Tommy4ever]

I'm sad to say that the only place I've read about this movement has been through links on revleft and other leftwing sites. I've seen next to nothing on the mainstream media except for once or twice when there were large riots.

The modern strategy for media dealing with social movements with any left wing undertones seems to be to totally ignore them. I remember how it took almost a week of tens of thousands of people being on the streets of Spain for that movement to get a passing mention on the news, likewise the movement in Israel has only in the past day or two made it into mainstream news sources.

[El Louton]

Supporting the students. I agree with Tommy4ever, nothing is in the media in the UK. Do you know what the Chilean Communist Party's view on this is? Good luck to the students! You obviously need new university's! According to Wiki, the demands are:

• Increased state support for public universities, which currently finance their activities mostly through tuition
• More equitable admissions process to prestigious universities, with less emphasis on the Prueba de Selección Universitaria standardized test
• New system of scholarships to provide free education (not loans) to poor and working-class students; reduction of interest rates from their current 5.8%
• Creation of a government agency to apply the law against profit in higher education and prosecute those universities that are allegedly using loopholes to profit. The students oppose direct (fellowship and voucher) and indirect government aid (government-backed loans) to for-profit schools.
• A more serious accreditation process to improve quality and end indirect state support for poor quality institutions
• Creation of an "intercultural university" that meets the unique demands of Mapuche students
• Repeal of laws forbidding student participation in university governance[14]

High school students are more loosely organized than the university students, with no national federation. However, their demands have also been included in CONFECH's proposal and include:

• Central government control over secondary and primary public schools, to replace the current system of municipal control which allegedly leads to inequalities
• The application of Chile's school voucher system in pre-school, primary and secondary levels be applicable only to nonprofit schools. The Chilean system, although defended by researchers linked to the conservative Heritage Foundation, is criticized by researchers like Martin Carnoy,[15] blaming it for the tremendous inequalities across all the Chilean educational system, measured by OECD's standards.
• Increases in state spending. Chile only spends 4.4% of GDP on education, compared to the 7% of GDP recommended by the UN for developed nations.[16] Additionally, Chile ranks behind only Peru in educational segregation among the 65 countries that take the PISA test. Prominent Chilean education researcher Mario Waissbluth has called the Chilean system "educational apartheid"[17]
• Use of student bus pass throughout the year
• Development of more vocational high schools
• Reconstruction of schools damaged during the 2010 Chilean earthquake
• Moratorium on the creation of new voucher/charter schools
• Higher pay for teachers and a national plan to attract the best talent to the profession and raise its social stature.[