Controversy because the C2 Catalan exam could be reviewed after a break

BarcelonaLast Saturday, 13,068 people took the written test to obtain the Catalan higher level certificate (C2), the official accreditation that teachers, various grades of civil servants, and language professionals need to practice their profession. The surprise, for some examinees, was that after taking a break, they were able to review the first part of the exam, which assesses reading comprehension and written expression, accounting for 57% of the grade and has been eliminatory for a few editions. Vilaweb has collected complaints from some users because they consider it an irregularity that lowers the exam's requirement and gives an advantage to the examinees.

Vilaweb has collected complaints from some users because they consider it an irregularity that lowers the exam's requirement and gives an advantage to the examinees.

L'ARA has confirmed that at the different points where the exam was taken (which took place in fourteen locations), this option was given because the answer booklet with the first two written compositions and the second part, which assesses vocabulary and grammar in a test-type format, were together. The third part is reading comprehension and oral expression. For Anna, who took the exam in Girona, it did not mean any substantial change: "I didn't even think of it. I needed time to do the second part. But it's true that if you finished quickly, reviewing everything was a gift." "I didn't even look at the previous part, because they are compositions, it's nothing you can copy or look up anywhere – Berta, who took the exam in Vilanova, agrees. This is like saying that in the oral part you have an advantage if you know what topic you have to talk about because you take the test ten minutes later."

Plataforma per la Llengua considers that this novelty in the exam "compromises the validity and credibility of the test" and "distorts the evaluation and reduces the value of Catalan". It is even considering filing a complaint. From the Ministry of Linguistic Policy, they downplay the matter and defend the "long and solid tradition" of the Catalan evaluation system. They consider that the first part of the test "assesses the ability to develop complex texts through skills such as data interpretation, synthesis, argumentative skills, or information structuring", which "would not be altered" by any occasional modification that was included later. And they conclude: "The overall assessment of competencies is valid and can be verified with the results".

"We are the government that is extending the tests the most and having the most people examined because we believe in the importance of having well-trained and accredited professionals in the Catalan language," say those from Francesc Xavier Vila's department. In a decade, the number of examinees for level C2 has gone from 1,745 in 2016 to 13,000 in this edition. In fact, in 2022, examinees made a leap that tripled the participants in the exam (it went from 2,363 to 6,913), mainly due to the intention of requesting the C2 from teachers. Since then, they have grown exponentially.