irene rigau

The Catalan Education Minister reminds her Spanish peer that such measures are not legal and do not correspond to the current legislation. The Spanish Education Minister, José Ignacio Wert, is considering giving public funds to privately-owned schools teaching in Spanish, which would set up a de facto parallel public school system in Catalonia and the Balearic Islands. Wert stated earlier this week that he would work to end the current Catalan school model, which is based on the linguistic immersion principle and guarantees the knowledge of both Spanish and Catalan by all pupils, as results show.

In the middle of the political storm referring to the relations between Catalonia and Spain, the Spanish Government announced an education reform that recentralises the school curriculum and evaluation system. The Catalan Education Ministry qualified the reform as a “total recentralisation” and a “total attack” against Catalonia’s Statute of Autonomy. In the reform, the Spanish Government would impose 65% of the school curriculum and would run evaluations at the end of school and high school.

Barcelona City Council is concerned about being able to maintain the current public kindergarten model taking into account the budget cuts announced by the Catalan Government to reduce public spending. While in 2011 the Government contributed €1,600 per child, next year the quantity might be reduced to €1,000.

The Spanish Minister for Education met with his counterparts from the Autonomous Communities and imposed 6 measures that must be adopted to save €3 billion. The Catalan Minister considers that three of the measures might invade powers managed by the Autonomies, and therefore the Spanish Government might be ruling beyond its jurisdiction. The Catalan Government will study them and does not rule out bringing the Spanish Government to the Constitutional Court. Nonetheless, the Spanish Minister reminded that, before a judge says the contrary, the measures are still obligatory. Besides, the Catalan Minister also emphasised the previous austerity efforts made by the Catalan Government also in Education, and the Spanish Ministry’s “lack of knowledge” about them.

The President urges institutions and citizens to defend the Catalan education system, which has been put at risk following a court order obliging the Government to include Spanish as a school language of instruction. Meanwhile, the Catalan Minister for Education, Irene Rigau, warns that on the 2nd of November the government “will not separate pupils by language”

The Catalan Supreme Court of Justice issues a court order giving the Catalan Government 2 months to change the current school model and include Spanish as a school language of instruction. The Government will appeal. Teacher unions and the main parent associations back the current model. Currently, Catalan is the language used and Spanish is taught in school but only as a subject. For the Catalan Government, the court decision breaks a model praised by international organisations, which guarantees social cohesion and the knowledge of both languages by all pupils.

The Catalan Minister for Education said that not all the 40,000 students that were meant to start the laptop programme at the next academic course will be able to do so. Although the main reason is due to the economic cutbacks, the Minister said that the are also pending teaching evaluations regarding the use of laptops.

The new Catalan Minister for Education was the CiU’s manager of this portfolio for seven years, while the party was not in power. She has experience, both as a primary school and university teacher. Over the last 30 years, she has held several positions in politics, mainly working on education issues, with the exception of the period in which she was the Catalan Minister for Social Welfare and Family (1999-2003).