Good leadership in a school is the second most important factor, according to teachers, in improving academic achievement, the recent UNESCO study concluded. Educational leadership: Guiding learning. The group agrees: “When management has time, resources and autonomy, centers achieve better results, less absenteeism and a better climate.” But the reality is different. Management feels overwhelmed, by the mountain of paperwork, and frustrated: they know what they should do, but they have neither time nor resources. “They ask us to do more and more things, but we no longer have hours. Bureaucracy eats us up”, summarizes Francisco Salmerón, director of the Sallarès i Pla school in Sabadell.
“The managers feel very alone, we have no advice, we are exposed and in the end we are teachers, even if sometimes the unions forget this. We have the feeling of giving ourselves to the lions and no one saves us”, adds the director of a school in Sant Cugat del Vallès. The managements regret, on some occasions, feeling consulted by all parties: unions, families, the Department or sometimes even by the teachers.
Although it had been simmering for some time, management’s unease began to emerge after the pandemic and peaked like the early start of the school year. Now it is reborn, promoted by a group of administrators from the Sant Andreu neighborhood of Barcelona, who were looking for a space to share concerns. “We have more and more open fronts, a lot of bureaucracy and no resources. We spend time putting out the fires of students and families, without thinking about improving results”, complains the spokesperson of the assembly, Marta Rubio, director of the Estel school in Barcelona. The movement had its first show of strength on October 23, when around 130 people in Barcelona gathered to share problems and solutions. From the meeting a manifesto emerged – also sent to families – with a list of complaints and proposals, grouped into three areas.
The first is the great theme of inclusive school, a great theoretical project that does not resist the daily life of classrooms. “They made a decree that on paper is ideal, but they didn’t provide sufficient resources. If you put a ANDschool support teacher for six students, the vetlladora will be able to take care of one, and five will remain unattended”, explains Salmerón. The management also regrets the cut of 130 social integrators and educators this year, a key figure in reducing absenteeism or communicating with families in centers with the most vulnerable students. In this area, the directors ask for more support staff and an improvement of the entire inclusive system. “I need the Department to give me a nurse, not to give me a question on how to look after the children”, says Rubio.
The directors also ask for a reduction in bureaucracy, recognition of their role and the inclusion of staff specialized in economic management, who are now hired by the secretary. “We are teachers, neither economists nor administrators. We need a specialist in drafting employment contracts, service contracts, tax returns, drawing up budgets…”, says Burgués. “We need a reorganization of our tasks, to know what we are, what we do and where we are going,” adds Salmerón.
Another battleground is the controversial personnel decree, which allows management to select teachers with a certain profile for a post, which unions reject, considering it encourages cronyism. “When you find a teacher who doesn’t have the profile or experience in highly complex centers, he struggles and ends up being fired. Any director wants the best teachers, I don’t think anyone wants to hire an inept friend,” says Sònia Burgués, director of the La Pau school in Barcelona. This year the model decree was suspended with the argument of the need to make room for the large number of new officials. “We could only apply for public employees, but if no public employee asked for the job, they sent you a temporary worker, and maybe you lost the temporary worker you had, who was very good and already knew the centre. It doesn’t make sense”, complains Burgués.
This change was reflected in the controversial July awards, which ended with Templates deputy editor Enric Trens being fired and the entire process repeated after it was discovered that the awards had been given following the model decreeand not a specific agreement between the Department and the unions. Precisely the termination of Trens generated a movement of rejection in Vallès, his area of origin and where he was known by the management. “We were shocked and a lot of indignation was generated. We decided that something had to be done, but the managers are always afraid to be noticed for fear of retaliation”, recognizes the director of Sant Cugat. They created a poster of support for Trens and created a chat with up to 200 people.
But then they saw the movement that was creating in Barcelona and decided to imitate it. An assembly will be held next Thursday in Sant Cugat at which the presence of 115 interlocutors has already been confirmed. They will share their problems and their solutions – very similar to those in Barcelona – and claim to be part of the solution. “We want to improve results, but we are not taken into consideration in the decision-making process; decisions are made by people who are not present in the classrooms: councilors, general directors or unions”, complains one of the directors who promoted the meeting.
One director position in four remained vacant
With all this set of difficulties, it is not surprising that it is difficult to find teachers who want to become principals. “It’s difficult to find candidates, being a director is not a business, you have a very big responsibility, it’s not well paid or well evaluated,” complains Salmerón. In the announcement for 406 management positions this year only 312 candidates showed up, so 23% remained vacant (then they are looking for a teacher from the center to fill it), according to the resolutions consulted by this newspaper.
“There are empty seats and in the majority there is only one candidate, what selection procedure is this?” asks Anna Jolonch, director of the educational leadership center LID Barcelona, which calls for professionalizing the figure of the director. Jolonch believes it is essential to improve the management selection and training process, create a support program during the first years, improve compensation and create a professional career after years in a management position. “If we talk about improving education, the professionalization of management should be high on the political agenda, and we don’t see it,” he concludes.
