The conflict in education has made evident the unrest felt in schools and institutes, as well as the difficulties in finding solutions. An increasingly unequal society is bringing serious social problems to educational institutions. Growing inequalities, extreme poverty, social violence, and mental illness generate conflicts that teachers must face without the necessary resources and with a sense of isolation and abandonment. Signs on the doors of some schools express this clearly: "We are outraged that the educational psychologist is not part of the school staff"; "We are outraged that we have to train ourselves in our free time and at our own expense in dyslexia, autism spectrum disorder, specific language impairment, ADHD, dyscalculia..."

"Either negotiation or resignation." This has been the main message repeated by the 35,000 teachers and professors – 100,000 according to the organizers – who demonstrated this Friday in Barcelona to show their rejection of the agreement that the Government signed with CCOO and UGT to improve teachers' working conditions and the situation in classrooms. Their refusal has resulted in what the unions have called a "total strike": almost half of the teachers (43.77%) have joined the strike – although the unions put this percentage as high as 85%. This figure is slightly higher than the participation reported by the Department of Education during the last strike the sector staged in Catalonia last February, when the final tally was 40.94%.

On the second day of the week of strikes in the education sector, the teachers' protest not only maintained its momentum but actually increased. This Tuesday, the strikes were called in the territorial services of Penedès, Tarragona, and Terres de l'Ebre, and according to the tally provided by the Department of Education, participation rose to 38.48%, six and a half points higher than Monday's strike in Barcelonès and Baix Llobregat (31%). However, the unions calling the mobilization (USTEC – the largest in the sector – Secondary School Teachers, CGT, and Intersindical) again reported a much higher number of professionals participating in the strike: they claim that 70% walked off the job on this second day of protest.

The agreement reached by the Department of Education with a minority of union representatives is important, despite not having secured the support of the majority of negotiators. In principle, it marks a turning point in the labor dispute with the administration by a highly relevant, sensitive, and strategic sector—we are talking about 129,327 workers—a group of professionals marked by a sense of grievance that extends beyond labor issues. Finding a way out of this teacher discontent is an essential step to face the future of education for Catalan children and adolescents with a modicum of hope. The country urgently needs to give education a new impetus.

Massive, historic, or resounding are just some of the adjectives used to describe this week's strike in the education sector. After years of limited mobilization, this February many teachers have said enough is enough and made their discontent with the system known with more than 70,000 professionals demonstrating across the country and a strike supported by almost half of all teachers (40.94%), according to the government's figures, and 85% by the teachers themselves.

All the unions in the sector, associations of families from both public and state-subsidized private schools, and various teachers' platforms have called for a demonstration this Saturday to demand improvements in Catalan education. The mobilization, which for the first time since 2022 – when Josep González-Cambray was Minister of Education under the ERC government – will be a unified one, kicking off at 12 noon in Plaça Urquinaona in Barcelona. Initially, the demonstration was called by the teachers' unions USTEC, ASPEPC, CCOO Ensenyament, CGT Ensenyament, and UGT Ensenyament to demand improvements in the working conditions of teachers. However, other organizations and platforms have ultimately joined the mobilization, each with their own specific demands.

The majority of teachers in Catalonia's public schools and institutes are dissatisfied with the educational curriculum they teach their students. This is one of the conclusions of a survey conducted by the Ustec union of 10,000 teachers in the system. Specifically, 73 percent responded that they are dissatisfied or very dissatisfied with the curriculum because they consider it "inadequate or disconnected from real needs." In this regard, Xavier Díez, coordinator of the Study Group on the State of the Teaching Profession (GEEPD), criticized the fact that "you can't create a curriculum without teachers' participation in its design" and indicated that the curriculum should be concise so that each individual curriculum is concise. Díez insisted that "teachers see the curricula as increasingly long and unattainable" and that "everything should be simpler" and "not have so many indicators to evaluate." In fact, one of the first measures announced by the previous government after the PISA test debacle was that a "specification of the learning objectives" would be sent to schools. The first concrete results came in April —two years later—, under the leadership of the current Minister, Esther Niubó. Furthermore, the spokesperson for Ustec, Iolanda Segura, also raised the issue of the reduction in teaching hours for subjects such as Catalan language and literature in high school in recent years. "If you want quality, you can't cut back," she insisted.

Changes to school and college teaching staff for the new academic year: teachers over 55 years of age will be able to request a reduction of two hours of class per week. As specified in the Official Journal of the Generalitat (DOGC) this Monday, teachers who benefit from this benefit will have to have reached the required age before September 1st and, for the first time, will not be required to remain at school during these hours. However, USTEC, the largest union in the sector, has expressed dissatisfaction with certain conditions of the agreement, and there is uncertainty about how all the staff who adopt the proposal will be replaced.