- STEILAS analyses the educational offer planned by the Basque Government for two-year-olds. It highlights the largest concerted offer in “competing municipalities”, especially in municipalities with over 10,000 inhabitants.
In 113 of the 187 municipalities that offer education in the CAPV, only a public network is available, of which 43 are small schools. In eight municipalities there is no public offer (La Puebla de Labarca, Iruraiz, Loiu, Anoeta, Ibarra, Irura, Lazkao and Usurbil), and STEILAS denounces that in these villages, instead of creating a public school, they have expanded their scope, that is, if you want to register in the public network, a village close to children is adapted.
The “clash” between the public and concerted educational network occurs in specific localities, especially in localities of over 10,000 inhabitants, “because public education guarantees the right to education in small populations where business is not the right to education”, according to the union. Specifically, in 64 municipalities of the CAPV we can find both public and concerted centres, and the data obtained by STEILAS show that 34 of them have a concerted offer higher than the public offer, 28 have a larger public offer and two have the same offer.
Andoain and Zamudio, 15% public offer
STEILAS has also read the data and stressed that in countries where there is competition from both networks the “public school” is being lost: “The offer of 2 years for the course 2023-2024 does not reach 45% in 27 of these municipalities. In addition, 13 localities do not reach 35%, with extreme cases such as Zarautz (32% public offer), Leioa (30%), Durango (28%), Bermeo and Orio (26%), Tolosa (24%) and Andoain and Zamudio (15%).
“Where there is a public and concerted offer, the concerted school is the one that offers the largest number of places and transfers the subsidiary function to the public school. This situation is aggravated in those municipalities where there is an excessive supply of concerted school places, well above the necessary places, and in some cases all the schooling needs of the municipality are exceeded”.
On the contrary, he adds that in some municipalities that have only public schools there are not enough public places, so the schooling needs of these municipalities are not met, such as Berriz, Derio, Urduliz, Legutiano, Astigarraga and Lasarte.
STEILAS warns that there is oversupply in the concerted network and that unnecessary places are being offered in several localities, even if there are free public places uncovered in the same locality.
You can read the document published by STEILAS in the following link.