The debate about the schools that separate by sex is reopened



The programmatic agreement between PSOE and United We can propose educational changes in the face of the current Lomce, including preventing sex segregation in centers supported by public funds, which has brought the debate between those in favor and in Against this educational model.

In Spain there are about 90 concerted centers that separate girls and boys, an education that for its defenders is called "differentiated" and for its "segregating" detractors.

The document of the "Progressive Coalition" states the following: "We will promote coeducation throughout the education system, preventing educational segregation on grounds of sex in centers supported by public funds."

"As a political decision it is very correct" since "we are in the 21st century and we aspire to equality between men and women," CCOO Secretary General Francisco García tells Efe.

On the contrary, the president of the Catholic Confederation of Parents of Students (Concapa), Pedro José Caballero, says that "in this country it is not segregated by sex, but that there is a differentiated school that is freely chosen by parents and, if there is demand, it is another type of guaranteed and legal education ".

With data provided to Efe from the autonomous communities in the 2018-19 academic year, the number of schools arranged only for boys or only for girls was 87, being Madrid (18), Catalonia (16) and Comunidad Valenciana (15) those more centers of this type added up.

On the contrary, they do not have concerted centers that separate by sex Aragón, Canarias, Castilla-La Mancha, Extremadura and the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla.

On the other hand, Andalusia had in 2018 nine centers that segregate by sex, Basque Country six, five Castilla y León and Galicia, four Navarra, two Asturias, Baleares, Murcia and La Rioja and one Cantabria.

Ending sex segregation in these concerted centers is an old vindication of the State Platform by the Public School and from CCOO, which is part of it, it is insisted that "in society or in the workplace, men and women share space "So" it makes no sense that they don't do it in the educational center, which is where you learn to live in society. "

García emphasizes that "for the moment there is only one agreement between two parties and we have to move from the muses to the theater, see how it materializes and clarify its regulatory framework."

Considers that the announcement not only refers to a political will on the new centers that want to separate by sex, but also those already established; "it would not make sense otherwise," he says.

On the other hand, the Concapa insists on defending an educational model endorsed by sentences and that is freely chosen by the parents.

"We will be against limiting the freedom of families to choose the type of education for their children," warns Caballero.

Among other judgments that guarantee subsidizing with public money schools that follow an education differentiated or segregated by sex is one of the Constitutional Court of April 2018, which ruled precisely against an appeal filed by the PSOE against several points of the Lomce.

The Constitutional recalled that various studies cited by the State Advocacy "show certain advantages of the educational modality of education differentiated by sex, so that both alternatives, the integrated and the differentiated, are likely to be chosen in freedom."

And he pointed out that sex-differentiated education, in the terms of the Convention on the fight against discrimination against UNESCO, is not discriminatory.

The acting Minister of Education, Isabel Celaá, has shown on several occasions in favor of "coeducar" and believes that "the egalitarian model brings more value."

The different degree of maturity of boys and girls at certain ages or the best performance if they study separately are some arguments used by defenders of differentiated education.

The 2018 OECD PISA report (to 15-year-old students) points out that the results "suggest that the gender gap in school performance is not determined by different innate abilities in boys and girls."

Among his conclusions, he states that girls spend more time on homework, the dropout rate is higher in boys and girls say they experience more fear of failure.

By Pilar Rodríguez Veiga

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