A statement from the workers of the Escola d’Escriptura de l’Ateneu Barcelonès yesterday gave voice to their discomfort at the recent statements in which the president, Isona Passola, assured that the institution “is in danger” and that “it has even been considered to close it” . In the text, the workers highlight the solvency of the school, which “is sustained solely and exclusively thanks to the enrollment of the students”, with a turnover last year of 1,400,000 euros, and that in addition the obligation of the students of paying the membership fee of the Ateneu is also an important source of income for it.
In the communiqué – signed by the director of the school, Pau Pérez, and writers who teach classes such as Mercedes Abad, Robert Juan-Cantavella, Laia Aguilar, Xènia Dyakonova, Mauricio Bach, Ramon Erra, Inés Macpherson, Jaume C. Pons Alorda, Eduard Márquez, Ricard Ruiz Garzón, Melcior Comes or Gerard Guix – also express the bad treatment that the school receives for them, such as the fact that currently workers who are not partners cannot enter the headquarters or their reluctance before a workers’ assembly to form a company committee – a process expected to culminate in mid-December.
The director of the school, Pau Pérez, reproached the board yesterday that “these ways of managing put a solvent company at risk, which is the largest writing school in Europe,” and also complained that until now no board of the Ateneu he has met with the workers, a fact that does not come from now but that the boards have always seen the school with a certain “displeasure”.
Sources from the Ateneu denied to this newspaper that there was a danger of closure at the moment, but they did acknowledge that they are “aware that there is discomfort among school workers” and that they are working “with their representatives and directors” to deal with it, and precisely “out of respect for the workers we prefer not to make statements.” It should be remembered that when she was elected president, in March 2021, Isona Passola assured that one of her objectives was precisely to strengthen the school and involve the students more.
The writer –and teacher at the school– Laia Aguilar recalled yesterday that the statement was born to support the school and specifically its management, because after Passola’s statements many students called to ask if they could enroll or if they were really in danger. “We are a very important part of the Ateneu,” she insisted.
This episode happens a few weeks after the resignation of Joan Safont and Teresa Mañà as members of the board following the dismissal of the director of the library, Àlex Cosials. Safont then announced that he was “uncomfortable with the presidentialist style prevailing in the current governance of the house”.
Catalan version, here
