In the Numancia of the Aragonese schools in front of the continuous day

The courts have forced a public school in Zaragoza to have the split-day schedule be until 5:00 p.m. and not until 4:00 p.m., as the management of that school had decided and endorsed by the Department of Education of the Government of Aragon. This is the Margarita Salas CP, one of the four centers in the La Romareda area of Zaragoza, whose parents did not accept the continuous shift and were surprised this 2022-2023 academic year with this management decision, which does not assume the rejection of families to the new School Times project.

The sentence was issued by the Superior Court of Justice of Aragon on June 1, four days after the regional elections that the PSOE government lost and which has been the one that, in its two terms, has extended the continuous working day to more than 80% of the schools supported with public funds in Aragon; It has done so under the umbrella of innovation projects which, in this regard, are called School Times and which entails ending school hours at 2:00 p.m., although there may be extracurricular or reinforcements until 5:00 p.m., which does not always happen.

To apply these Times, they must be approved by the School Council of each center, in which teachers, parents, administration and other members of the educational community are represented.. The project needs 60% of the support and, if it does not go ahead, it cannot be voted on again in two years.

The four of La Romareda

Among the few Aragonese schools that have resisted this strategy are four that are located in one of the upper-middle-income areas of the city, next to the La Romareda football stadium. Son los CPs Doctor Azúa, Cesáreo Alierta, César Augusto and Margarita Salas. As in none of the four the schedule change went ahead, the teachers, with the backing of the Administration, agreed in June 2022 to change the split schedule, so that classes ended in those schools at 4:00 p.m. and not at 5:00 p.m. , reducing the time at noon by one hour, with the possibility of scheduling extracurricular classes from 4:00 to 5:00 p.m..

The parents flatly rejected these new schedules, since they consider that they violate the right to education, and they initiated different forms of complaint based on the steps taken by the aforementioned schools.. Some applied them and others did not, to the detriment of all, since there is a circumstance that they share bus routes and extracurricular activities, joint sports and a 3-hour dining service, which were altered by the changes.. Together, they add up to no less than 1,700 students.

Doctor Azúa made a consultation and, as it came out negative, he did not change the schedule; Cesar Augusto did not ask and did not change it either. However, the directions of Cesáreo Alierta and Margarita Salas, despite having consulted and the school community rejected the change, decided to apply the new split schedule, advancing the start, for the sake of their “autonomy” in the management. The parents of both schools took the conflict to court. Cesáreo Alierta complied with the sentence and rectified the schedule in February. Margarita Salas maintained it and, together with the DGA, appealed the ruling of court no. 3 of Zaragoza, which had agreed with the parents.

In the appeal, the Ministry of Education argued that the issue was not part of the fundamental right to education and that there was no non-compliance. Obviously, the AMPA of the school and the prosecutor's office again opposed.

Finally, the ruling of the TSJA published last day 1 dictates that the right to education in the right to parental participation has been violated and urges that any time change be agreed with all the guarantees and ensure the conditions of availability for the students of the services and facilities, and that the schedule allows the realization of all the programmed activities. The Court goes so far as to describe the procedure for the change of hours at Margarita Salas as a “coup” by a group of people, to whom the Ministry has provided coverage with the appeal.

“The plans are not fulfilled, except in schedules”

With the sentence, in September, the schedule will be the same as always, but until when? The parents explain that it is a true sword of Damocles, since the process can be restarted every two years. In fact, they consider that the two schools that accepted the negative response were to avoid consuming the option of voting for the advance of one hour, compared to the most desired for teachers of the continuous day.

From the Ministry of Education they have received the sentence, which sentences them to costs, with the evident “respect for judicial decisions”. And about how the processes are dealt with in schools that do not want to change their schedule, they describe that “there is an established procedure for the approval of the School Times project that the centers must follow. But, within the autonomy of the center, in the last School Council of the year, they can propose a change of schedule for the following course. In any case, the Department of Education, through the Co-responsible Plan, finances the activities organized by the centers to cover the entire schedule and facilitate family reconciliation”.

Actually, that Correspondents program is not guaranteed. This course that is now ending, at Cesar Alierta, during the time they left at 4:00 p.m., many families were left out of the program due to lack of budget and had to pay for monitors from 4:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m..

The same is said by parents from other Aragonese schools that have experienced discretionary schedule changes from the management, until they have voted in favor of the continuous. “Then, except for the schedules, we have found that the plans that are painted in the Tiempos Escolanes projects are not fulfilled and the activities do not exist,” they denounce..

For the 2023-2024 academic year, 83.37% of the Aragonese public schools —in figures, 341 out of 409—, will apply these projects for the organization of School Times or, what is the same, the continuous day.

Tension between parents and teachers

“The tension that exists in schools is unbearable, explains one of the parents who calls for the traditional day. We are immersed in a climate of confrontation between parents and teachers, and between parents in favor of one option or another, which harms the good coexistence that should prevail at school”.

Undoubtedly, with this educational policy, the regional government has guaranteed social peace with the always active teaching unions but, as experts are beginning to point out, at the expense of families, students and society. The OECD has just published a study recommending that Spain eliminate the continuous day to fight against early school leaving, estimated in our country at 13.9%, well above the 9% set by the EU. Only Romania has worse data.

The continuous shift is the majority in public Infant and Primary education centers in almost all the autonomous communities and close to 47% of households pay for extracurricular classes for their children, in many cases on basic subjects and in low-income families. Meanwhile, countries like Denmark and Portugal apply full time, with dining room and extracurricular activities.

“The continuous day is a torpedo against the public school, which is the one that mostly applies it,” explains one of the parents of La Romareda. “The concerted one maintains traditional schedules with density of contents; in the public, not everyone can pay for extracurricular classes, so we can find that children with fewer resources are expelled from school at two in the afternoon, and without eating”.

In fact, the parents of the Romareda centers also fear that this conflict will end up affecting the quality of the dining room, now their own: “If the continuous day is imposed, fewer children will stay, we will not be able to pay for the kitchen and we will end up with catering for minors quality”.

The OECD call is the first from a supranational reference body on a practice that has been deployed in a very short time and to which they are raising their voices due to the effects it is having among schoolchildren, and which translates, in addition to school failure, increasing addictions and violent attitudes.

More time in school improves the underprivileged

In the case of Aragon, President Javier Lambán himself launched as a star electoral proposal an investment plan of 75 million euros for extracurricular activities and dining scholarships. The announcement was used by the teaching unions, who want the new schedules to be dictated by the Administration and not put to a vote, to say that the problem was the payment of extracurricular classes, not the school hours, which they believe should be finish at 2:00 p.m..

The OECD in its report emphasizes that spending more time in the educational center allows higher graduation rates and improves learning, and that these advantages are greater in disadvantaged students. And invites teachers to be better paid and have greater job stability, given their high temporary. Also, to prepare an “index of vulnerable centers” for the allocation of resources based on their needs, within a plan to reduce early school leaving.

Likewise, the OECD report endorsed the study by the EsadeEcPol Center for Economic Policies, which warned that the continuous working day, apart from reducing performance, represents a loss of 8,048 million euros per year for families and that the most affected are mothers, who see their working life reduced.