public education
Assembly theme (Cuts in public education)
The assembly on Friday September 16th at 20:00 in the Plaza del Castillo will again be meeting on current topics in public education cuts.
It seems that public services are in the crosshairs of the markets. From constitutional reform to the recent cuts in education announced in Navarra, everything points to the privatization of the profitable parts of these services and the transformation of other services in welfare systems.
Cuts in public education.
Teachers in Navarra has started to move to protest these cuts affect, in principle, their working conditions: they have increased their work hours and 250 interns have been fired.
We have doubts about whether this reduction is mainly a problem “Profs”.
Is the quality of public education is not going to be affected at all?
Do our children will receive the same content of a teacher who has to serve more than 300 students?
Do parents will receive the same attention and information from teachers saturated?
Can students with difficulties will receive the same personalized service?
Will they keep all educational programs, electives and remedial classes for our students?
Are you going to implement some kind of cut to the concert?
Do students go to receive the teaching they deserve or cuts will force teachers to teach subjects for which they are not qualified?
We are, in short, a bit lost. We believe that public education is that of all the guarantees that we will receive a quality education, not segregated based on income or beliefs. Therefore, we can think of weird ideas, like maybe you could cut other less important items for the citizens and not a public service that ensures that all have the same opportunities.
The cuts in education, public school crackdown
Around the school year usually put the beginning of a new phase which is renewed challenges and objectives, however, this time, and the crisis management has confirmed the worst predictions were announced earlier this summer. The pressure exerted on Spain markets to end budget deficits has come to the regional government. The cuts have been felt especially in public education, autonomous regions such as Madrid, Galicia, Castillo la Mancha, Catalonia and Navarra, where he chooses to focus on education as an expense and not as an investment, ignoring that this approach spending and investment, ignoring it is one of the pillars of the welfare state, essential for the construction of democracy and equality, as well as social and economic development.
An example of the snip is taking place in Madrid with a 15% reduction in workforce (nearly 3,200 teachers and temporary teachers) and other measures, such as increased teaching hours of teachers in secondary and headquarters department, or downsizing for the coordination of ICT and bilingual projects in infant and primary schools or his / coordinator / a library. It also abolishes or reduces local improvement plans in schools and institutes.
The consequences of the actions carried out in Madrid, in addition to those already made during 2009-10, and those of other communities where you are administering medicine cuts in education (it is estimated that this course will have 13,000 teachers and professors less, compared to an increase of 4.2% of students) are going to be reflected in the organization of public schools, which will have fewer human, financial and material.
The failure to hire teachers and increasing class hours (not after hours, as at first declared the President of the Community of Madrid), and the suppression budget for programs translates into increased number of students and students per class, the removal of small groups in instrumental and laboratory subjects, the suppression of orientation programs, school projects, the more difficult to unfold and support to those who have learning difficulties, less extracurricular activities, difficulty to meet the casualties illness or the need to cover subjects with non-specialist teachers on the subject … in short, a process that greatly hinder the goals we must ask ourselves to develop a quality education, where everyone has equal opportunity of access to knowledge, self development and learning of democratic coexistence, as part of their training as citizens.
It is hard to read between the lines of the concept of educational model that is defended after cuts.
First, it maintains a schizophrenic speech on the teacher. On the one hand raises the need to give authority to the teacher (an end that we defend as the best performing education systems are those where the teacher’s work is highly valued), but on the other, hints do not work enough (the comments in this regard Esperanza Aguirre y Ana Borelli, were eloquent).
Secondly there is the education as an expense to be reduced, without regard to generate knowledge depends on the country’s development and, above all, education is a fundamental right of individuals throughout life, and essential in the early stages. Early education has proven to be essential for the development of the individual correction factor of inequality and social cohesion.