The Educational Assembly of Catalonia (AEC) has begun preparing a new calendar of mobilizations and strikes in response to a situation it describes as a “serious educational emergency” and after noting that at the start of the new school year many of the problems that motivated the sector’s protests remain — according to their complaints.
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The assembly met this Saturday in L’Hospitalet de l’Infant and rejected the request of the Education Minister, Esther Niubó, to open “a pause” in the mobilizations. “Our discontent as education workers is too deep,” the AEC states in a statement released after the assembly.
The assemblies and unions participating in the protests have thus begun planning new actions and stoppages, although no dates have been released. The group says it maintains an open debate process to set common goals for the different educational sectors, among which it cites educational support staff (PAE), administration and services staff (PAS), and workers in educational leisure, the first cycle of early childhood education, teachers of early childhood, primary, secondary, and post-compulsory education.
Among the problems detected at the start of the school year, the AEC denounces the existence of classrooms with high temperatures and insufficient ventilation, and the arrival of new students without a parallel increase in teaching staff. They also denounce the lack of resources to support inclusive education and reception classrooms.
The assembly also points out that there are interim teachers who will not receive their salary due, according to the statement, to “technical issues” from the Department of Education.
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The Educational Assembly maintains that the demands that drove the previous mobilizations remain “practically intact” and reproaches the Generalitat for not having opened joint negotiations with the group and the unions through a strike committee representing all educational sectors.
The statement also questions the level of education funding. The AEC recalls that 17 years ago legislation set as a reference an investment equivalent to 6% of GDP and states that spending has remained practically around 3%.
The group cites the mobilization of last September 8 as a precedent and assures that they will continue organizing to decide the next steps. “The struggle will be long,” concludes the Educational Assembly.
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