The reasons for the strike in education, by Teresa Esperabé


The staff of public and concerted educational centers, teachers, educational support, midday, administration and services, among others, let’s go on strike Like all groups of workers we have the right to improve our working conditions or, at the very least, not to allow them to make things worse for us. We also have the right to be treated with respect by the highest political authority in education in Catalonia.

Our collective is tired. We are tired of many years of cuts that have left us with much worse working conditions than those we had at the end of the 20th century, tired of the management of the pandemic by the Department of Education that it has not provided us with sufficient resources or prevention measures to do our job safely. We’re also fed up with the contempt of the Ministry, that informs at the press conference of all the news that affect our working conditions, without negotiating anything, without taking into account our opinion at all. Changes in education cannot be made behind the backs of its professionals. The modification of the school calendar has only been the last straw, but we have many accumulated grievances.

For example, for many years the teaching staff have been teaching more hours than before the cuts, that we no longer receive the first six-year term at 6 but rather at 9 years of service, that we lose purchasing power year after year and so many other losses that the Department of Education is inflexible to return, despite the fact that the 2008 crisis is over a long time ago. But the personnel of the educational centers not only ask that what was taken from us be returned to us, we ask for many other improvements for education, because our working conditions are inseparable from the conditions of education. We also ask for the investment of 6% of GDP in education established by the Parliament itself in the Llei d’Educación de Catalunya in 2009 (currently it is 3.6%), the drop in ratios at all levels, a sufficient supply of vocational training places, more resources for inclusive schools, the recognition of the educational task of leisure, a universal and free dining service… But unfortunately we have not been very successful in these demands either.

We are faced with a Ministry more interested in showing public opinion that it makes many decisions for the “good” of the student body, than in agreeing on them with the educational community itself. Even so, it turns out that this student body that the ‘conseller’ presumes to take into account is forced to learn very often in barracks or in groups with overratios, You cannot access the VET studies you want or you do not receive the resources you need from the educational system if you have a specific educational need.

Related news

One of these supposedly ‘good’ decisions for students is changing resumes that will force the teaching staff to change all the pedagogical approaches from one day to the next and that will take hours away from many specialties as important as philosophy or technology. Another has been the modification of the school calendar, advancing the start of classes a few days so that there will only be two to four days left to prepare for the course in September, which is the only non-school time in which the entire team can be counted on of professionals from educational centers. And all this after two very hard years of the pandemic, without informing the workers of the educational centers, without consulting anything, without negotiating anything… Even the School Council of Catalonia, which represents the entire educational community, students, families and teachers, among others, had to find out about the change in the calendar through the media.

Is this really the respect we deserve? Do we really have to hear that if the ‘minister’ does not consult the unions, our legitimate representatives as education professionals, is it because we are immobile and could not carry out their proposals? I don’t know if the ‘conseller’ Josep Gonzàlez-Cambray knows that democracy does not work as he seems to want, that the educational authorities cannot make certain decisions without consulting. Even so, don’t suffer, Mr ‘Minister’, unions and education workers do know what our rights are.


Leave a Comment