Basic skills begin: the final test for Catalan in the classroom

BarcelonaThis Monday begins one of the most decisive weeks for the Catalan education system. Although for students, basic skills tests are just another exam—in fact, the Catalan government makes it clear that these tests do not affect a student's final assessment or determine whether or not they pass a particular educational stage—when it comes down to it, they are the main indicator of how effective the measures applied in Catalan schools are.

Still reeling from the poor results in the PISA tests and after years of the pandemic's impact on Catalan classrooms, the exams that all sixth-grade students (a total of 78,850) will take this week are the current state of Catalan schools since Minister Esther Niubó arrived at the Department of Education last summer.

It will also be an important test to analyze the state of health of Catalan in the classrooms in a scenario that combines concern about the low use of the language that is highlight the latest Survey of Linguistic Uses and the concern about what the future of language immersion will be when the court rules on the 25% requirement for Spanish in schools and colleges. Added to all this is a further challenge: if the trend of the last four years isn't reversed, the 2025 exams could be the first in which 4th-year compulsory secondary school students fail Catalan.

Since 2021, the Catalan language proficiency level of students between the ages of 15 and 16 has dropped by about two points each year. This trend has meant that in the latest tests, the Catalan proficiency level in the fourth year of compulsory secondary education was the lowest since 2012, at 70.7 points. However, according to the criteria set by the Higher Council for the Evaluation of the Education System, the body that organizes the tests, the red line that marks the minimum for considering that competencies in a subject have been achieved is 70 points. Thus, if the decline of recent years continues, the results will fall below this threshold for the first time.

Beyond Catalan, all eyes will also be on mathematics, the only subject that failed on average in last year's tests. It's a situation that has been repeated every academic year since 2012, with the exception of 2017 and 2020, when 4th-year ESO students barely passed the exams, with a 70.1 and 70.2 respectively.

Read the questions on the computer

Although the most worrying results are those recorded in secondary school, this year the first to take the basic skills tests will be sixth-grade students. From this Monday until Wednesday, all 12-year-old students will take the Catalan, Spanish, mathematics, English, and natural language tests.

All students will take the tests by answering self-correcting questionnaires in writing, but reading the PDFs on a computer screen. This method of taking the tests was implemented last year, but this year, after the Government announced that he wants to restrict screens in schools, has sparked some criticism within the sector. In fact, some schools have asked the department to print test statements to avoid having to consult exercises on screens, but the Department of Education has refused permission to make this change, arguing that all students should take the tests under the same conditions and claiming a need to "save paper."

As for 4th-year ESO students, tests will be held on Thursday and Friday with exams in math, Catalan, Spanish, English, and science and technology.