News in teaching competitive examinations: the C2 of Catalan will be mandatory

BarcelonaA step forward to ensure that all teachers in Catalonia have the C2 level of Catalan, as set out in the 2009 Education Law. As ARA has learned, this academic year teaching competitive examinations will finally be called –for both pre-primary and primary education, as well as secondary– and, as a new feature, the C2 level of Catalan will become mandatory. Although this information still needs to be presented to the sectoral board with the unions scheduled for next November 12, the forecast on the table is for the tests to take place during the month of March 2027.

The C2 Catalan requirement for teaching staff is a historic debt. It already appears in the 2009 Education Law of Catalonia (LEC), but it had never been effectively applied. In fact, one only needs to look at the last teaching competitive examination call from last year to see that in the linguistic field the requirement was to certify the C1 proficiency level of the Catalan language, that is, the level of Catalan obtained automatically if you have completed the entire ESO in Catalonia. In contrast, the C2 level of Catalan added points as "merits", despite not being mandatory. Now, this changes completely and all teachers who apply for the competitive examinations in 2027 will have to present the C2 level of Catalan or take a test to demonstrate that they have an equivalent level of the Catalan language.

Years of moratoriums

Beyond what the 2009 LEC already established, in 2022 the ERC government activated the C2 Catalan requirement for teachers in 2022 with 2024 in mind, but it was later postponed. First to prioritize staff stabilization and then because it was one of the articles included in the 2024 language regime decree that had been preventively frozen by the High Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC). However, in September 2025, the TSJC made a move, annulling a large part of the decree. With that move, however, the non-annulled articles were no longer suspended, and among them is the one that speaks about the Catalan level of teachers.

Specifically, article 36 of the decree establishes that to participate in the competitive examinations to work as a teacher in public educational centers, it will be necessary to certify the C2 level of Catalan. The same regulation indicates that, in the event that the teacher does not have the certificate, they will be able to continue in the competition by proving that they have "sufficient competence" with a specific Catalan test of a level equivalent to C2.