These agreements largely resemble principles proposed by the National Task Force for the Advancement of Education (the Dovrat Commission) in 2005. One of the chapter’s two primary focal points is a comparison of the major items in the agreements signed with the teachers to the parallel items in the recommendations of the Dovrat Commission. The other is an attempt to answer the question of why the Task Force recommendations encountered such sweeping opposition on the part of the teachers’ unions, when the agreements that were eventually signed – after prolonged strikes and bitter struggles – are so similar to the original recommendations. The answer suggested here is that the two primary reasons for the wide rejection were the Dovrat Commission’s preference not to increase the government budget for education, and its unwillingness to allow the teachers’ unions a voice in formulating the recommendations. Furthermore, the Dovrat Commission’s recommendations on some issues contradicted positions deeply rooted and widely accepted within the teacher community.
This paper appears in the Center’s annual publication State of the Nation Report – Society, Economy and Policy 2011-2012.