Thousands of students from Baccalaureate, ESO and Professional Training They mobilized this Friday throughout Spain to protest against the new University Access Test (PAU)of which they are not yet clear about the exam pattern. Convened by the Students’ Union, they took place today more than 50 concentrations in educational centers and in front of the Ministries of Education of several autonomous communities, without significant incidents.
The main reason for the protests is lack of information on the new selection exams, which will be unified for the first time at the national level. Students criticize that exam patterns are released in a fragmented manner and with delays, generating great uncertainty among students and teachers. “We want options, not confusion” And “we have 100% anxiety” were some of the messages visible on the protesters’ banners.
In Madrid, around 100 students They marched from the Ministry of Education to Puerta del Sol under the slogan “Enough of destroying public education. It’s not just the PAU, it’s everything.” The general secretary of the Students’ Union, Coral Latorre, explained to the media that in the Community of Madrid the exam models will be known on October 17while in other communities, such as Catalonia or Andalusia, different dates are used, which generates more confusion.
Students during a rally in front of the Department of Education, Sciences and Universities of the Community of Madrid.
Latorre also issued a warning: If the exam models are not published by Monday October 14, the student union will call for a new strike for Friday October 18. “If this exam is not published, we will start striking again. There are thousands of students here in great uncertainty and what we need to do is take the exams immediately,” he said. -he declared.
In addition to the students’ concern, Latorre stressed that teachers are also upset because they were not able to adequately prepare the teaching materials. According to her, many teachers do not know if the content they teach will be part of the new selectivity exam. “The only thing we are asking is that the Ministry of Education and the departments do their job and publish this exam now,” he insisted.
Protests in other cities
In Barcelona, Hundreds of students marched to Francia Station and, in Sant Jaume Square, demanded that the Generalitat publish the exam models before October 14. Otherwise, they threatened – as in Madrid – to call for a new demonstration on the 18th. Guillermo Prietospokesperson for the Catalan Student Union, expressed his discomfort: “We have been in class for a month and We still don’t know what the tests will look like. who will decide the future of thousands of students Country Catalans and the rest of the Spanish State”.
In Murciaaround a hundred students gathered in front of the Ministry of Education under large police forceswhich was deployed after the disturbances recorded during a previous demonstration. The leaders of IU and Podemos also participated in the demonstration. José Luis Álvarez Castellanos, secretary general of Izquierda Unida in Murcia, criticized the police deployment, calling it “exaggerated”.
A group of students demonstrate in Seville.
The follow-up to the strike was diversified in the different autonomous communities. In Castile and Leonthe autonomous administration indicated that participation had reached 25% at noon, while in Valencia, the Students’ Union put him in a 95%. In the Balearic Islands, the Ministry of Education has indicated that it is monitoring 8.8%and in Extremadura, only 2.13% students supported the strike.
In Oviedo And Gijon barely a hundred people participated in the demonstrations. Meanwhile, in Navarre, Hundreds of students marched from the Ministry of Education to the government delegation. In Santander, The Federation and the Student Front described the Administration’s response as “insufficient”, and in the Basque Country There were also mobilizations in the three capitals.
“I only know that I know nothing,” says a student poster in connection with the selectivity exam.
Next steps
While some communities have already published exam models and evaluation criteria, others have not yet done so. The dates of selectivity are fixed for the days June 3, 4 and 5 in most communities, although Catalonia announced that its exams would take place on June 11, 12 and 13.
The Coordinator of Student Representatives of Public Universities (CREUP) supported the mobilizations and joined the critics for the “poor management of the PAU”. They consider that the recommendations of university rectors have been “insufficient” and “empty”.
In a press release, they stressed that the new PAU does not resolve the problem of differences between territories and generates “quite a few doubts”, because a single examination model “reduces critical thinking” and “reduces the maturity of the ‘exam”.
