Families are waiting to see if the extracurricular activities in the afternoons in September are covered as Educació ensures
The Ustec union warns that this month is going to be “a real disaster” due to the “poor planning” of school advancement
Catalonia begins a school year this Monday in which it leaves behind the measures due to the coronavirus pandemic, it will not have strikes in September after the agreement between the Government and unions on the reduction of one teaching hour for teachers and without percentages of languages in the classrooms after the approval of the decree that establishes its non-application and the decision of the TSJC to reject precautionary measures to teach at least one subject in Spanish.
Between this Monday and Wednesday a total of 1,588,733 students, about 5,000 less than in the previous year. The first to do so, this day 5, are the approximately 700,000 children and primary school children. On the 7th, the secondary, ESO and high school classes will begin.
The advancement of the start of the course this year makes Catalonia the first autonomous community to reopen schools after the summer break. The Catalans used to be the last to start classes. This has changed now and the intention of the ‘conseller’, Josep Gonzàlez-Cambray, is that the change stays. This course, the measure will suppose that during September the schools will intensive day (from 09:00 to 13:00), but the boys and girls will be able to stay in the center until 16:30 since the Department of Education will finance a extracurricular activity for all. According to the ‘conselleria’, practically all the contracts of educational leisure companies have been signed to cover these activities. This extreme is not very clear to families, who will be very aware this Monday that the afternoon activities are tied and are of quality.
You predict “chaos” and “disaster”
From the majority union, Ustec, they have already advanced that this September is going to be “chaos”. “It will be chaos and a real disaster because school advancement has been an imposed, poorly planned measure and we will suffer the consequences,” warned the union spokeswoman, Iolanda Segura. She has questioned whether extracurricular activities are covered: “There is a lack of monitors and we are receiving many complaints from the directors of centers and families.”
This course also begins with new incorporations of centers to the public network: the Institut Escola Projecte (Barcelona), previously concerted; the Institut Escola Maria Miret (L’Hospitalet de Llobregat), formerly Acadèmia Cultura and the Institut Miquel Biada (Mataró), until now municipal. There are also new centers resulting from mergers: the Balàfia-Pinyana school (Lleida), the La Vila school (Polinyà), Castellfollit del Boix and the Barcelona Logistics Institute.
Joly is still without school
There will be things that are not ready this Monday. For example, there is students still without assigned place. This is the case of Joly, an intellectually disabled minor who is prevented from enrolling in a special education center. her mother, Trini Acosta, I was desperate this Sunday. “We don’t know anything. Nobody from Educació has spoken. What are we playing at?” She says about to burst into tears.
The case of Joly, who suffers from Pitt-Hopkins syndrome, was picked up a few days ago by EL PERIÓDICO; With a disability of 68% and an IQ of 25, she went to an ordinary school in Vilanova i la Geltrú (Garraf) until this year. The doctors who take her consider that the 10-year-old girl would be better cared for and would evolve better in a special center. The family agrees. At the Aspace center in Barcelona they save her a place, but until the Consorci d’Educació gives the go-ahead she cannot enroll. The Síndica de Greuges has asked for explanations of the case, but they have not received a response either.
Nor will more than 20,000 young people waiting for a place in FP be able to start classes on time. They will have to wait until after September 21, which is the day that Educació will assign them what and where they will study.
Without the barracks and without a patio
In the Narcisa Freixas i Cruells Institute of Sabadell (Vallès Occidental), 4th ESO students will not be able to start classes normally. The works of the module that should host their classes have been delayed and will not be ready this September 7. The 60 students will have to be relocated to other classrooms in the center. Also, the yard won’t be ready either. The management has communicated to the families that the facilities will not be finished until September 12, if there are no unforeseen events.
Rose Gonzalo, vice president of the Narcisa Freixas AFA, expresses the discontent of the families: “Educació promised us that the new institute – the entire center is now in barracks – would be there for the 23-24 academic year. They sold us smoke because the drafting of the The project has not even entered the budgets. It will be impossible for the new institute to be there for next year,” he says. “We are already clear that the students who finish this year 4th of ESO will have to look for another center to do high school”, he points out before recalling that “many families signed their children up for the institute thinking that the new center would be there and that there would be continuity”. “They have sold us smoke,” she denounces.
They are not the only ones who will have a rough start to the course. In ancient Culture Academy of L’Hospitalet de Llobregat -now, Institut Escola Maria Miret- have not finished the works of adaptation of the facilities for Early Childhood Education students. Thus, children from 3 to 6 years old will return to class without a dining room or accessible toilets. In the Norai de Montgat school (Maresme), where this course offers one more group, they are still waiting for the new classroom furniture.
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In La Bisbal (Baix Empordà), the infant students of the Joan de Margarit school and those of Bisbal Vocational Training Institute They will also not be able to start classes on the scheduled day because the hailstorm that fell last week has caused damage to the buildings.
In Mollet (Vallès Oriental), the Can Vila special education school has had to delay the start of the course for a week because the installation work on the modules has not finished. “And not even delaying the start will we have the works finished. It is expected that the first of the two modules may be in operation at the end of October,” laments Amador Rincón, spokesman for the family association. This Monday at 5:30 p.m. they have organized a march in Granollers to claim their right to a quality education.