Changes will affect the registration of 2-year-old boys and girls – not pupils already in school – as well as those who register late after the school year: all schools must reserve a number of places for vulnerable pupils. In the following years, the changes would progressively extend to the remaining ages. LAB and STEILAS criticize that it only affects 2-year-olds. “It will take 16 years to affect all stages and levels. We believe that the reservation of places should also be made at the beginning of the different stages of teaching, because it is not certain that a student who enlists in the course of 2 years will complete the journey in the same center, even more when the compulsory schooling is not until the age of 6, so no measures are proposed to deal with the imbalances that occur in the following courses”, says LAB.

In the scale (score for the choice of center), the new process assumes a change: if the selected center is the closest center to the family home, it will have 7 points and if another center of the area of influence is chosen, 5 points. Until now, the fact that the residence is in the area of influence gave 6 points. For the LAB trade union, the additional point given to strengthen the next one is not enough, and also calls for the points given to the members of the cooperative to be removed.

STEILAS is pleased to see that the proximity of the centre is more visible, but it is not clear that above this proximity there is always a public school of Model D to which it is requested. In fact, there are cases of families who have not found model D when choosing a nearby center. In the sphere of influence of all families, it would be necessary to guarantee not only a sufficient public offer of model D, but also a secular offer, adds LAB.

Both the trade unions cited and the Basque Public School’s Pride Platform have warned that among the changes made by the Government the areas of influence have been rearranged, that the area they occupy is now larger: “It encourages competition between schools and endangers the most vulnerable centers, most of them public,” the platform says. In addition, the expansion of the area of influence may mean that some vulnerable students have to move to another neighborhood or even another village, say the agents, or that in some small towns there is no direct public offer, as children will move to some nearby village, adds the platform.

Other criticisms have also been made of the registration process. Thus, for example, an ancestral claim, at local and local level, of the establishment of a single registration office, “establishing the appropriate control measures”, that the variables that will define the vulnerable student are not known, and that with the Basque Public School there is an oversupply of concerted places, “which will harm and directly reduce the public network, since the creation of new public places” has been agreed upon.

However, despite the changes in the registration process, STEILAS and Harro stress that the core is another and that while the current dual model (public/concerted) is maintained, segregation will not be adequately addressed. “To put an end to universal consultation and to open a real way of publishing”, added the platform that the path is not “to distribute to students of one kind or another” but “to build a balanced and strong network of public schools”.