Several state school teachers went on strike yesterday. They are also said to have called on pupils to take part in their demonstrations in various towns in the Comunidad Valenciana, as some press reports suggest. As always, the figures for participation in the strike vary widely. They range from 20% to 68%.
This strike came as a surprise to many parents. I found out about it from a reader of my blog and from a few conversations with parents at the local youth football training session the evening before. So yesterday morning at the school entrance in Jávea I saw some parents who were completely unaware of the strike. My grandchildren's parents hadn't been given any notice either. At no school in Jávea was there any indication, for example through banners, posters or similar, that there was a strike.
At the end of March this year, the popular initiative for the right of parents to choose the language of instruction for their children failed in the Valencian parliament. The new government, consisting of PP and VOX, had reserved the right to decide on this issue itself instead of the parents and, in breach of its election promises, decided to treat this issue differently depending on the region. Divide and rule.
To this end, the law on multilingualism (Ley de Plurilingüismo) passed by the previous government (PSOE and Compromís [=quasi Greens]) was abolished. This was at least a small step forward, because the so-called multilingualism consisted of a drastic increase in the compulsory use of Valenciano; in some schools and grades, Spanish was nominally only tolerated as a language of instruction at 25%. The preferred subjects were music, math and sport, as these do not focus on the linguistic development of pupils.
The fact that this rigid language imposition can now no longer be enforced has obviously outraged some teachers so much that they have decided to go on strike. The communication to some families states: „The 'freedom of education' is characterized by the fact that there is no domination of one language over the other, and the bill proposed by PP-VOX further exacerbates the situation of asymmetric bilingualism that we suffer from.“1 Unfortunately, it is not clearly explained what the teachers mean by asymmetric bilingualism, from which they suffer so much. One can deduce this from their demand: „To correct this asymmetrical bilingualism, compensatory measures are needed for the official language, which is in a situation of minorization both at the level of educational planning and at the level of language use“2 In other words, the majority speaks Spanish and we, the teachers, want to change that.
In order to dress it all up a bit socially, demands for improvements in the education system were also made for this strike. For the most part, these demands are certainly justified, and I don't want to debate that here. But as ElMundo.es3 reported: „This is the first major strike that the PP and VOX government has had to face after just one year in office, and the first in this sector in 12 years“. Isn't it very interesting that it takes 12 years to discover your social conscience?
As I said, that's not really the point. It's about an ideology of linguistic dominance and a Catalan empire. The current Valencian president, Carlos Mazón, also criticized the associations calling for the strike because the terms 'Països Catalans' or 'País Valencià' appear in their names.4 It is positive that the current Valencian government, in line with the majority in Valencia and Catalonia, has no desire for separatism. It would be even better if the government and striking teachers respected the right of parents to decide on the language of instruction for their children.
There are two official languages in Valencia, therefore: YES to Valenciano. YES to Spanish. YES to the right of parents to choose the language of instruction for their children. NO to language impositions.
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