The PSC, ERC, Junts and the commons have registered this Tuesday a bill proposal in the Parliament of Catalonia “on the use and learning of the official languages in non-university education”, with the idea of responding to, that abide by the ruling of the Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) that obliges the Generalitat to teach at least one core subject in Spanish or 25% of the classes throughout the educational system of the community.
The text of the agreement, which will be approved in the plenary session this week by the single reading procedure and due to extraordinary urgency, establishes Catalan as the language “normally used as the vehicular and learning language of the educational system” and the use of Spanish It refers to the linguistic projects of the centers, whose use will be conditioned by various factors, including the use of Spanish in the patios and the dining room, for example, and also the use of the Internet for educational resources.
These factors that will determine the use of Spanish in schools and institutes, beyond the linguistic subject, will be “the general sociolinguistic situation”, “the objectives of linguistic normalization” and “the evolution of the linguistic, oral and written learning process , in accordance with the instruments of control, evaluation and improvement of linguistic competences». To determine the scope of the “presence” of the official languages, a global vision will be taken into account that must include “all educational spaces and learning resources, including those of a digital nature”.
The reference to Spanish in the bill, which in the March agreement of the same four groups received the category of “learning language”, a pact broken by Junts, is now limited to appearing as “curricular use”, without any reference to its use as a vehicular language or language of learning, and is limited to specifying the teaching and curricular use “of Catalan and Spanish” and not the use of subjects ‘in’ the official languages of Catalonia.
When the new law comes into force, once it has been approved in the Catalan Parliament this week and is published in the Official Gazette of the Government of Catalonia (DOGC), schools will have to adapt their language projects, which will be “verified” by the Ministry of Education, which thus assumes all legal responsibility in the event of possible legal challenges. In this way, the four groups intend, with this “verification”, to take pressure off the directors of the educational centers.
The bill, which has only two articles and three additional provisions, has been celebrated by the representatives of Junts and the commons, shortly after announcing the agreement, pointing out that the proposal “shields” linguistic immersion, a educational model that the courts have declared illegal if it is applied, as until now, with 100% of the subjects in Catalan and leaving the use of Spanish “residual”.
Thus, both David Cid and Mònica Sales de la Cruz, spokespersons for the commons and for Junts, respectively, have made it clear that the legislative proposal maintains Catalan as the only vehicular language in schools in Catalonia. “This text is not compliance with the 25% sentence, but rather a response,” added Sales de la Cruz, in response to the press to present the agreement.
