Complaints and concerns have been raised among the staff of the centres about the training activity Curriculum Digital that the CAV Department of Education has established for teachers. There are many discrepancies in procedures, content and organisation. Although the problem is now there, it is not an isolated issue, but this situation brings to light the old accents of our administration, as the roots of deep concern are not new. Therefore, at Steilas we believe it is necessary to reflect on this.

To begin with, it has to be said that pedagogical improvement is often ordered as a downward process. Innovation services (berritzegunes, Irale...) thus become merely instruments to guide the procedures and criteria of administration. Many teachers and many schools are involved in interesting innovation processes, but mutual collaboration and the enriching exchange of experiences are not being prioritized by the administration in the organization of public education and its support services.

On the other hand, the continuous legislative and curricular changes, and in some of their excessive specificities, are channeled with excessively technical and complex processes, which often replace the real pedagogical change with bureaucracy and sterile textual production. The formal need to adapt to the law, decrees, curricula, etc. usually prevails, instead of the direct impact of acting with the students. Many teachers think that many hours of work are lost in unnecessary tasks.

In addition, the administration does not carry out its work properly and within adequate time limits. In fact, it forces centers to work with draft curricula pending final officers. In addition, the Curriculum Digital project, which conditions the training plan throughout the course, has been explained and launched in the months of the beginning of the school year, with the training plans planned in the schools since the 2021-2022 course. The improvisation and imposition of the administration often go hand in hand.

In training projects such as the Digital Curriculum, where are the steps taken by each school, its evaluation, proposals, training needs...? Digital Curriculum all hours of teacher training (and more!) when you eat, where is the reflection on the needs of the center and the steps to follow? The lack of autonomy of public centres has again become apparent. Little respect for the school’s own programs and the daily effort and effort of many professionals working in the improvement of their school center, when many things have been suspended in schools to implement the Digital Curriculum. This is particularly serious when many public centres are trying to respond to very complex realities, in complicated conditions, and teachers have necessary priorities for training hours.

Moreover, it is surprising that some school projects have a supply of private companies and/or financial institutions, since the participation of private interests in education, from the university, is increasing. In addition, there is no strong decision in the CAPV to create its own management and school work plans in the field of ICT, or to use free software, and agreements with large companies in the sector are preferred. Education is an increasingly interesting business centre for certain economic sectors of society and this requires the cooperation of educational administrations. The commodification of education is not only a risk, but an increasingly widespread reality.

Steilas has always committed to pedagogical innovation, and we will continue to do so, because with the desire to transform our society school goes. Most teachers and educational staff seek improvement in daily practice, but sometimes management decisions become obstacles. The Administration should promote, facilitate, guide, follow, support and evaluate innovation projects at school. And along that path, you have to listen to the centers, collecting them as active subjects of innovation. And it should also listen to critical opinions, since in the face of a project one cannot attribute to all the opposing expressions indifference or inactivity, since in many occasions it is people and groups with involvement of years in pedagogical innovation that show a critical attitude.

Josean Bueno Saez de Albeniz, Jone Gibelalde Iribas and Nagore Landa Longarte. STEILAS Trade Union