The foreseeable lack of monitors for extracurricular activities in September in Catalan schools, denounced by EL PERIÓDICO, has activated the alerts. The Department of Education maintains its plans that this month there intensive day in infant and primary, although boards of directors had raised the possibility of reducing the days of intensive work due to the problems of finding enough monitors for that hour (3:30 to 4:30 p.m.) of extracurricular activities. This option has been ruled out and the Department is working with the centers to help them find staff. The will of the ‘conselleria’ is that the addresses go on vacation with this issue resolved.
Aside from these efforts, yes, there has been a change which has been communicated by Educació to the addresses in the last hours and that affects the number of monitors each school will have depending on the number of students. The Department of Josep González-Cambray had planned a ratio of one monitor for every 16 students. From here the centers made their calculations. In a typical nursery and primary school with two lines, there are 450 students. 28 monitors would correspond.
The directors have been surprised this week when they have received a notification from the ‘conselleria’ informing them of the number of monitors that corresponds to them. A figure that, regarding the typical school, is six monitors less.
Given the commotion, on Thursday at the last minute the directors received a clarification: the ratio of monitors is calculated not over 100% of the school students, but about 80%. Thus, the typical school of 450 students has 22 monitors.
From the employer’s association of educational leisure companies Acellec, Pep Montes explained to this newspaper a few days ago that it is estimated that 80% of the students will participate in extracurricular activities. The remaining 20% is not supposed to stay for lunch or come back in the afternoon to participate in extracurricular activities. She admitted, however, that “it is difficult to forecast.”
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To find out exactly how many families will leave their children after school (from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.), the Department has asked the centers to conduct a survey among families. This is how the addresses have done it, but they warn that it will not be reliable data because there will be families who do not know it yet, others who say one thing and then change their mind and others who do not even answer.
The addresses consulted interpret this adjustment of the calculation of ratios as a way to solve the problem of the lack of monitors. “It is a fudge“says a director, concerned about the situation in which the schools will be left where all the students stay until 4:30 p.m. They remember that the schools have been warning of all these problems since February. “No one in the Department had thought that they would be missing monitors?” asks one. “They have jumped into the pool without looking to see if there was water,” adds another, reflecting the discomfort that exists among the directors for the management of the ‘ministry.