A high school in L'Hospitalet, the first center to ask to leave the plan to send a cop there

BarcelonaThe Margarida Xirgu institute in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat has requested to withdraw from the Education and Interior plan which contemplates integrating an undercover police officer in schools, as confirmed by center and union sources to ARA. The move was announced by the CUP in the Parliament session this Wednesday, stating that a center in the municipality had asked to withdraw from the pilot program. For now, however, the Education department has not confirmed the step. In the same vein, sources from USTEC —the majority union in the education sector— also indicate that some centers in Vic would have also communicated to educational inspection that they wish to cease being part of the pilot plan.

Margarida Xirgu was one of the two centers in L'Hospitalet that had joined the pilot plan for school coexistence in the area of prevention and mediation that the Government made public this Tuesday and which had been launched this week in 14 schools and institutes across the country. Exactly 24 hours ago, the Minister of Education Esther Niubó explained that, after the controversy generated around the plan, the department had contacted all the selected centers to apply the pilot program to find out if they wanted to continue in the program and all had responded yes. Now, however, the management of this institute in L'Hospitalet would have changed its mind and has requested to withdraw from the test.

This Thursday, President Salvador Illa defended the pilot program in Parliament, reiterating that the program is voluntary and that if "no one wants it, it will not be implemented". Yesterday, Minister Niubó expressed herself in the same way, insisting that "in no case has the plan been imposed on any center". In fact, the Government also explained that there were more centers that in the last few hours had requested to join the project, but that, for now, the plan cannot be expanded.

Without entering the classrooms and unarmed

The plan that began to take shape at the beginning of the school year foresees integrating an undercover and unarmed agent of the Mossos d'Esquadra into schools to carry out mediation and coexistence improvement tasks. Niubó clarified that they are agents trained in coexistence and that they already had contact with educational centers. He also explained that the officer is not expected to enter classrooms and that their function will be subject to the pedagogical leadership of the school and institute administrations.

Regarding the centers chosen to test the plan, the minister also detailed that "they have not been chosen because they are problematic," and that all types of schools and institutes had been approached. In principle, the plan is to be extended to 14 schools and institutes in the educational areas of l'Hospitalet, Vic, l'Alta Ribagorça-Vall d'Aran, and Tàrrega; and also to two centers in El Prat de Llobregat and Sabadell.