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

BarcelonaThe Margarida Xirgu institute in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat has requested to withdraw from the Education and Interior plan that includes integrating an undercover police officer at the center, as confirmed by sources from the center and unions to ARA. The move was announced by CUP in the Parliament plenary session this Wednesday, although, for the moment, the Department of Education has not confirmed the step.

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 was launched this week in 14 schools and institutes throughout the country. Just 24 hours ago, the Minister of Education, Esther Niubó, explained that, after the controversy generated around the plan, the department had contacted all the chosen centers to apply the pilot test to find out if they wanted to continue in the program and all had responded that they did. Now, however, the management of this institute in L'Hospitalet would have changed its opinion and has requested to withdraw from the test.

This Thursday, President Salvador Illa defended the pilot test 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 vein, 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 hourshad asked to join the project, but that, for the moment, the plan cannot be expanded.

Without entering the classrooms and unarmed

The plan, which began to be developed at the start of the school year, foresees integrating an undercover and unarmed agent from 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. She also explained that the police officer is not expected to enter classrooms and that their role will be subordinate to the pedagogical leadership of the school and institute managements.

Regarding the centers chosen to trial the plan, the counselor also detailed that "they have not been chosen because they are conflictive," and that all types of schools and institutes had been proposed. 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.