ABOUT 60 per cent of teachers with the Fijian Teachers Association are women.
FTA executive committee member Iva Powell Volavola said while the association members were 58 per cent women, there was still a gender gap in the leadership roles within the executive leadership roles.
“In 2022, there were seven women executive members out of 39 and then after last year, we now have only three,” she said.
“So the onus is on us, the women committee members, to identify where we can be more visible and how can we strategise to make sure that 58 per cent of women will be willing to be on the board because we feel that women issues are union issues too.”
Mrs Volavola said the association had been stepping up its capacity-building efforts for women members.
“Among the milestones we have achieved is our entrepreneurship projects like mobile markets every Saturday when we invite our women members to come over to our parking lot at FTA for our market day.
“This also allows us to meet weekly to discuss important issues and assist each other in addressing them.”
She said one of the ongoing issues the association discussed this year was the removal of the no repeat policy by government.
“We’ve got a lot of issues that we are now facing in the education sector like the no repeat policy.
“That is not working.
“We have tried to put in our two cents with our working committee, and they have taken that up.
“And we are pleased to report that just recently they have passed a Bill on that where we have the retention policy which is making its rounds again in our education system.”
