Go Public! Invest in Education Support Personnel: Ensure
inclusive education.
Education Support Personnel (ESP) have a critical role to play in supporting and sustaining educational communities and the students within them – especially those who have are excluded and marginalized.
Without ESP, schools would not be welcoming and clean, children would go hungry, their behavioural and health issues would go unaddressed, their academic, socio-emotional and practical needs would not be met, and they might not even make it to school safely.
Declining public education budgets and privatisation severely impact their job security, pay, workload, rights, and wellbeing. In the face of austerity, increasing privatisation and declining public funding, it is crucial to enable ESP to participate in shaping schools and education systems, to safeguard their rights and ensure good working conditions.
This means mobilizing and organizing ESP and a commitment to making sure their voices are meaningfully included in education unions.
Education Support Personnel are recognized annually on World Education Support Personnel Day introduced by Education International (EI) on
May 16th, 2018, to celebrate the vital role of ESP in equitable and inclusive
education systems and ensuring quality education for all.
Education International's longstanding advocacy for ESP Rights and Status
The recommendations of the United Nations on the teaching profession– where EI made sure the voice of all educators was heard – state that “education support personnel are key workers in education who should work interdependently with teachers and enjoy commensurate working conditions as teachers.”
World ESP Day webinar
To find out more about EI and the work of our member organizations join our World ESP Day meeting on May 14th. Click here to register.
The online meeting, Go Public! Invest in Education Support Personnel: Ensure inclusive education, will provide ample space for EI member organizations representing ESP to come together, share their experiences around the role of ESP in supporting inclusion in education, as well as union wins and challenges when supporting the inclusion of ESP in schools and union structures. We will also discuss how unionists best support each other and build union power to defend the rights and status of education support personnel.
Join our campaign and raise your voice for public education everywhere!
Spread the word by sharing the resources below as we mobilize to Go Public and fund ESP!
We have a sample World ESP Day video script and graphics (including EI logo). You can use it to record your own video for ESP Day to congratulate your members.
Raise your voice in support of Education Support Personnel on social networks. Use the suggested posts and images below and don’t forget to tag Education International so we can amplify your message:
Syria: Union calls for mother-tongue education as a cornerstone of inclusive and democratic societies
On the occasion of Kurdish Language Day, the Union of Teachers in North and East Syria (UTNES), an affiliate of Education International (EI), has renewed its call for the official recognition of the Kurdish language in Syria, stressing that mother-tongue education is a fundamental human right and a cornerstone of...
Education support personnel and education unions unite for gender justice
This year’s World Education Support Personnel (ESP) Day, May 16th, is an opportunity to celebrate, thank, and organise alongside ESP. Education International (EI) and its member organisations are focusing on gender justice in 2026. This reflects a structural reality across education systems worldwide: education support roles are highly feminised, systematically...
Education support personnel in public education in Mexico
Francisco González Mena
Mexico is one of the twenty-seven countries that form part of Education International in North America and the Caribbean. Mexico’s national union of education workers, the SNTE, is one of the world’s largest, with a total membership of 1.6 million active workers and 1 million retired workers. Of the former,...
May Day: Wisdom workers of the world, unite, inspire, lead!
We are Education International. We are over 33 million teachers and education workers across 180 countries and territories. We educate the world.
In our classrooms, in our schools and universities, in our communities, we stand together for public education, for our profession, for people and planet.
