1. Legitimacy
900 institutions and 30,000 individuals support the movement. It has 12,000 likes on Facebook. Approximately 10,000 people took part on average in the three demonstrations. In the civil disobedience a maximum of 10,000 people.

The outlines of the I Would Teach Movement are fluid: impossible to be sure who and what they support. The January letter from the Otto Herman Gymnasium (secondary school) moved many, but this is closer to a vague dissatisfaction – which encompasses the state of public education, as well as a general resistance to the government. At the same time it’s not clear what exactly they are dissatisfied with, exactly where, how many exactly, what they want, what they expect, what they are prepared for, and so on.

In this form the Movement is doomed. Momentum will carry it for a little while, but the old messages, the various points and catchphrases, grow threadbare, empty out, and supporters dismiss it disappointedly: this one was just like the others, the government is stronger than us, there’s no hope left. I think duly stringent self-criticism important, and the taking seriously of earlier experiences. Milla (“One Million Hungarians for Freeedom”) seemed strong too, and the students’ movement; the internet tax took the largest crowd to the streets, and…?

The first and most important question is what gives the Movement legitimacy. Though there are examples of letters going to known addresses and receiving approving responses, this relationship is not predictable, the communication sporadic. It hasn’t been decided that there’s now a leadership, which indicates a direction and has it accepted, or that there is a community, which decides on the basis of votes, and acts through the lead organisers. The current situation is neither directly nor representatively democratic.

Since the whole movement began with a letter written by one person, Olivér Pilz, it seems legitimate to suggest that the group which will become the movement’s leaders should be formed. The leadership group declares first internally, then publicly, that they are henceforth the Movement’s leaders. The leadership establishes its programme, determines the movement’s structure and goal-setting, sets a work agenda, etc.

This is the only chance for substantive work to begin. The present situation, which is constantly grappling with internal crisis, is unsustainable. I recommend bravery. The message must be made clear that the current leadership wants to propel the movement until it becomes capable of democratic organisation. A system must be constructed in which decisions can be made according to clear rules at both local and national level. In its current state the Movement is not capable of conducting balloting, since it’s not clear what we want in the first place.

So the Movement’s leadership delivers its vows to make the Movement mouldable and comprehensible, establish its internal structure, etc., and with time hold its first ballots. Our legitimacy currently derives from the fact that roughly 10,000 people support us. But this 10,000 is composed not only of teachers, students, or school workers, but also civilians, even politicians. Neither the organisation of the demonstrations, nor communication with the media, nor even the organisation and documentation of the Movement’s gatherings, have happened so far without the activists. I would like to suggest with all this that the Movement cannot remain merely a teachers’ movement. I take it to be a false and untenable claim that the movement belongs solely to the teachers. This Movement belongs to society. The question of public education isn’t ‘only’ about public education. A series of social, economic, political, and philosophic questions are raised by the I Would Teach Movement’s existence. It’s about civic courage, about self-determination, about local government, about the role of state institutions and the nature of their relation to citizens, budgets, generational questions, employers’ and workers’ rights and responsibilities, cultural attitudes, the society of the future, the state of knowledge, self-esteem, about freedom and so on ad infinitum. The school issue is symbolic, which is precisely why it’s a political issue. The Movement cannot escape its fate: this is a political movement. If only because in the public space all criticism touching the government is at the same time an anti-government rallying cry. It isn’t us who want it so, but if it is so, we cannot evade it. Insofar as the current Government is not willing to cooperate with those who criticise it, obviously we cannot work with this Government. It’s possible to act cautiously in this, but not worthwhile: more useful by far to step into the role that – though we do not mean to topple a Government – if the Government does not take us seriously, we won’t take the Government seriously. We want a Government which listens to us and takes us seriously, which empowers instead of oppressing us, which respects instead of humiliating us. It doesn’t matter to us whether it be right or left wing, as long as it takes our issues seriously; as long as they try to make us into a laughing stock, we won’t bargain. And here comes the generally human and at the same time political charge: we claim to have equal rights. In fact the I Would Teach Movement stands on republican foundations, and wants to alter not a few technical questions in public education, but the foundations themselves. It is a freedom party, of equal rights and solidarity.

2. Structure
My suggestion is that we establish a team of at most 10 people as the I Would Teach Movement’s coordinating and strategic leadership. This group determines the theoretical and practical frameworks, the strategy, the plan of work and its allocation, communication, etc. Those prepared to undertake theoretical and practical work on a daily basis and as volunteers join this team. This group names building the Movement’s democratic foundations by next summer as its supreme objective, so that before the next school year (May at latest) the first national leadership ballots can be held. The Movement’s registered members can participate in the voting, which we organise online.

The responsibilities of the 10-person leadership team:

• principles
• goals
• plans
• tools (infrastructure, paid workforce, volunteers, media)
• communication
• membership
• partners/network
• supporters

The members of the leadership group commit to membership for a definite period, until June 2017. The leadership decides on a majority basis. Members who assume the various tasks are required to report back. Anyone who does not fulfil their commitments regularly can be removed by majority decision. Anyone who does not assume practical tasks is automatically removed from the management team.

Working groups delegated to individual executives, with involvement of volunteers:

• relations with academic experts in public education, the Civil Platform for Public Education (Civil Közoktatási Platform, CKP) – concrete results to deadlines!
• roadshow organisers and participants – meeting with public figures, expansion of membership, testing principles and goals, democratic practices (i.e. voting)
• organising internal training: what kind of education do we want, what responsibilities does it come with, system-level primer, mistakes of the last 26 years, activist training, education – trade union, strike, civil disobedience
• national and international outlook, networking, contacts with existing movements – Park Defenders (Ligetvédők), Refugee Issue (Menekült-ügy), National Minimum (Nemzeti Minimum), healthcare workers
• media communication – faces and news editors
• Facebook communication – not just news but posts, questionnaires, etc.
• newsletters, communication with registered members, mobilisation
• organisers of public events, demonstrations

Membership:

• who is instantly contactable (emails, telephone numbers)
• facebook campaign - join us
• road show (most enthusiastic schools, civic groups, cities)

The proposed structure does not work without one/two assistants, organisers (paid at least part-time). Likewise we’ll need an office (one room), with at least one computer. For this, at the lower end, we need 3–5 million HUF, which were best collected from public donations, perhaps through a well-organised Indiegogo campaign. It’d do good for our legitimacy if we could raise this money without involving a foreign fund: legitimacy: no party nor foreign funders support us, we are not party members, we are not ‘foreign agents’, we are supported directly by the people.

3. Mission
The I Would Teach Movement’s task is not negotiation with the Government but:

• what kind of education we want
• how many people want this
• exerting pressure.

So the assertion is: we know what it is we want, and we demand that it be what is. Insofar as the Government does not want it, the question is which party does. Whichever party wants it is the party we call on Hungarian voters to support.

Principles

• An opportunity-creating, competency-based and freedom-loving school system.
• A creative, supportive society.
• Dissemination and development of democratic principles and practices.
• Network-building, self-preservation, autonomy.

Goals

• The principles of New Public Education – theory.
• Public Education law and budget proposal.
• Informing, involving the public.
• Membership expansion and democratisation.
• National Movement – 100,000 registered members (!) by June 2017.
• Movement elections.

4. Work plan

2016

Early August – 10-person leadership group membership; principles, goals, plan of work

Late August – long training weekend for all volunteers who first join the programme announced by the leadership group, max. 100 people, first public balloting at this event.

Early September – 1st general assembly: announcement and publicising of the Movement’s programme, presentation of the leadership group, report on training weekend, announcement of freevoting.hu: vote on the movement programme.

September-February – experts invited by the Movement (and delegated by the Civil Platform for Public Education) begin work.

a) curriculum

b) law

c) budget.

September-February – promoting and coordinating the programme in schools, with other civic movements, organisations, institutions.

October 23 – 2nd general assembly – announcing results of the vote, introducing affiliated organisations, the Movement’s demonstration of power – gestures of solidarity: we pass the stage to other important, current affairs.

December – the I Would Teach Movement focuses expressly on segregation, poverty, child malnutrition – membership operations/stunts – big concert - festival - National Minimum programme. 

2017

March 15 – 3rd general assembly – at X points of the country: curriculum, law, budget declaration; 24-hour operation by organisations, private individuals, supporters – we demand that you accept this – we have given a deadline.

May-June – 4th general assembly – results of the Movement’s first national ballots, legitimate leadership, new trade union, talks with political parties regarding preparations for the 2018 elections.

Árpád Schilling