Teachers require SEP to assume payments for extended hours

Basic education teachers demanded that the Ministry of Public Education (SEP) assume its responsibility as an employer and modify the rules of operation of the La Escuela Es Nuestra (LEEN) program, so that it is the agency that pays their overtime and not the parents, as established by the current guidelines. 
In an interview, professors pointed out that, before the disappearance of Full-Time Schools (ETC), it was the states that received the money from the program and made their payments electronically, but not before signing contracts that formalized the employment relationship.
They noted that there were sometimes delays in payments, but there was a clear working relationship with the authorities. Now that this responsibility has been delegated to parents, they explained, they have no clarity on what procedure will be followed.

“Before we signed a contract with the State Secretary of Education, which gave us a bank card where our support arrived for the overtime we stayed in Full-Time Schools, but now we do not know how it will be, if there will be a contract or if the payment will be in cash … we don’t know anything and this responsibility should not be theirs,” said Professor Olegario Pina, from Chilpancingo, Guerrero.
“We are in a worse situation, our rights are being violated because we are professionals and who must pay us directly is the employer – the Ministry of Public Education – with whom we have a contractual relationship with rights and obligations, but now the SEP is disclosing itself from that responsibility.”
With the disappearance of Full-Time Schools, in 2021 the School Is Our program assumed the responsibilities of the public policy in force since 2007. 

Last year, given the health emergency, no budget was allocated to overtime and food services, as students remained half a school year 2021-2022 at home, so the entire resource was allocated to the improvement of the educational infrastructure.
The problem came in 2022, when the SEP decided to eliminate the components of food and extended hours that were provided to some 27,000 schools that in the last 15 years had become full-time schools.
Read: 190 school days for the 2022-2023 school calendar
After weeks in which teachers, parents and society complained about the disappearance of these services, the SEP modified the rules of operation, included both components and instructed that, in order to avoid intermediaries, it will be the parents who will pay the teachers directly.
Even the program’s operating manuals include a promissory note – which can be printed on any sheet – which must be signed by parents and teachers and will remain as proof that the payment was made.
If this is not possible, the rules of operation themselves provide that any receipt containing the date, name and signature of the person who delivers the support, as well as the name and signature of the person receiving it, may be valid.
Auditing, in uncertainty
“The CEAP (School Committees of Participatory Administration) through the treasurer (a) will be responsible for making the payment of the economic support that the program allocates directly to the managerial, teaching and support staff (intendant),” say the modified operating rules that the SEP announced.
Fernando Alcázar, director of the legal studies area of the organization Mexicanos Primero, recalled that Full-Time Schools was a program that was subject to much stricter requirements and considerations, so to disperse the resources he used the support of the states. However, now with La Escuela Es Nuestra this component is erased – in order to ensure that there are no intermediaries – and has been transformed into a subsidy program with a different logic.
“We are in total uncertainty in the control (of resources),” the expert warned.
It is unclear how parents will pay compensation to teachers. “We do not know, in many cases we can assume that it will be in cash because that way it is more convenient for the communities; however, keeping track of cash is very complicated,” he said.
For the expert, the simple receipts proposed by the SEP that are proof that the payments were made promote opacity and lack of accountability.
“They’re giving dads and moms a disproportionate responsibility in every way to pay them on time and make sure the bills are okay. (The SEP) is excusing itself from oversight responsibilities and those responsible for any misappropriation of resources will be moms and dads and that is very serious,” reclicked Alcazar.
The opacity in the use of public resources of La Escuela Es Nuestra has already been evidenced by the Superior Audit of the Federation (ASF), which found that in 2020 the program ‘lost’ one of every two pesos it received, that is, there is no evidence that 573 of the thousand 187 million pesos of the audited budget in 2020 have been used in the improvement of educational infrastructure, guiding objective of public policy.
Disagreements on the table
Ana Cecilia, a primary school teacher in the State of Mexico, considered it positive that parents are in charge of resources to avoid intermediaries, but pointed out that the authorities cannot dissociate themselves from the responsibility of their payments. If they cannot do so, he urged them to create specific places for them because of the extended hours.
The authorities, he insisted, cannot leave them in uncertainty. 
“Of course we have no distrust of parents, but that is not their job, we are professionals, we have spent years dedicating ourselves to this and the authorities cannot leave us like that in nothing,” he said.
“The infrastructure resource we think is right for parents to exercise, the payment of food that parents exercise, but the compensation of us we do not agree, it is not a whim, we are professionals and we are not doing less to parents, but who must pay teachers is the Secretary of Education.”
Teachers and representatives of 29 entities in the country have joined the National Movement of Education Workers of the Full-Time Schools Program and have held working tables with experts, parents and legislators in the Chamber of Deputies, where they have expressed their dissatisfaction with the decisions taken by the SEP.
In five working groups, the concerns regarding Full-Time Schools were presented and the legislative authorities took note of all this in order to be able to compile a detailed report that they will deliver to the Political Coordination Board (Jucopo), so that based on this decisions can be made and / or request the intervention of other authorities.
Although this report was scheduled to be delivered in recent days, the Education Commission headed by Deputy Tania Cruz extended the delivery of the volume until June 30.
According to the teachers, these conclusions could help their demand to the SEP to modify once again the rules of operation of La Escuela Es Nuestra and assume its responsibilities towards teachers. 
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Original source in Spanish