The 2023-24 school year will begin on the same day in the infant, primary and secondary stages and the afternoons of the month of September will be classes. Thus, the advance from the beginning of classes to the first week of September will be maintained, as has already happened this course. The exact start date is yet to be determined.
This course began on September 5 in infant education and two days later in primary education, although with an intensive day that lasted the entire month.
Patrícia Gomà, general secretary of the Ministry of Education announced this Wednesday the data after the plenary meeting of the Catalan School Council (CEC) in which a manifesto was approved that includes the consensus on these two points.
The CEC, the highest advisory body in education, has approved a report in which it will also propose to the Ministry of Education that the next course begin with a margin of days “sufficient to prepare the course”, although it has not specified dates.
By 19 votes in favor, 15 against and 3 abstentions, the School Council, chaired by Jesús Viñas, has considered that “a rationalization of the calendar is necessary because long holidays are not positive for students”, the president himself told the media after the CEC meeting.
Jesús Viñas added that the debate in the CEC commissions has been “very intense” and that “many aspects have been seen with a diversity of opinions” and that for this reason a “complex” document has been born that should serve for the department ” can establish the school calendar as it deems best”.
According to the president, there has been “a lot of agreement” that “it is necessary to start the course normally”, with school afternoons, and that the course starts on the same day in primary and secondary schools and “with enough time to prepare the course “but without specifying dates because “it is something that is the responsibility of the department”.
Patrícia Gomà has valued “being able to count on the debate and contributions of the educational community” within the framework of CEC, which in her report reflects that “it is necessary to rationalize the school calendar” and “advance the start of the course to the first week of September” in schools and institutes. “We will consolidate an advance of the school calendar to the first week of September taking into account that the afternoons of September are school days” in “pro of equity and educational quality”, stressed the representative of the department.
Patrícia Gomà has added that the department will transfer to the union table the specific proposal for the start of the school year, but not that the afternoons are school hours or that the course starts on the same day in all stages of compulsory education because they are aspects “that do not modify working conditions and it is not necessary to negotiate them”.
For her part, the representative of CC.OO. in the CEC, Rosa Villaró, has lamented “the instrumentalization” of the Consell because she considers that the report that she will present to the department is “so ambiguous” and “does not specify anything” that “Education will interpret it to the benefit of its interests and wills” to prepare a Calendar Order for the next course “to the extent of your will” and that includes “an advance of the course as soon as possible” and “that the afternoons of September are classes”.
According to Rosa Villaró, the report “should have been worked on for longer” and “have reached more consensus”, because the one approved today “is limited to collecting the disparity of opinions that have been evidenced in the three previous meetings” and ” It is open to interpretations.”
The Ministry will take into account the considerations that the CEC transfers to it in the report and with this it will prepare the School Calendar Order, which it will transfer again to the CEC, who will vote on it and present an opinion with its conclusions.
