The cries of children, their parents and their teachers, could be seen and heard across the Orihuela Costa on Monday as over 200 people besieged the Playa Flamenca Town Hall to demonstrate and to demand answers about the appalling state of primary education on the coast.
Their mandate was quite simple; much more speed with the construction of a new school for the coast, an educational centre, which both the previous and the current Councils stated would be open and receiving students for the current course, but which has still not seen the light of day.
The current Oriolano PP-Vox executive decided to build the new centre on the same plot that had previously housed the Playas de Orihuela school in portable accommodation, on Calle Níspero, parallel to the main route into Villamartín.
It is a site that now, under the criteria of the Department of Education, requires a great deal of foundation works to be able, as required, to establish the prefabricated classrooms on two levels. The council, led by mayor Pepe Vegara, spent 60,000 euros last September for the completion of the works, but, for the moment, the only thing that has been done is clearing up all the waste, debris and equipment that the council has been dumping on the site for many years, and the cleaning and pruning of the area.
All the time that our elected councillors sit on their hands, the two schools in Orihuela Costa continue to suffer from high ratios of students per classroom, due to the continued increase in recent years in the number of newly arrived students, particularly those who arrive outside the enrolment period; Most of them move into the area from overseas so they not know the language, an increase that falls in line with the continuous increase in inhabitants on the Oriola coast, and that making the situation in schools like Los Dolses unsustainable, where the teachers have sacrificed their common areas and are even holding classes in the corridors due to lack of space.
This Monday’s protests were called two weeks ago by parents. There was no organisation behind the demonstration, simply a homemade poster that was widely circulated on social media.
The poster stated “the families of Orihuela Costa were fed up with hearing promises that are not kept by the City Council and that they demand quality education with decent conditions for both teachers and students.” As the movement grew it was joined by the FAPA Enric Valor, the FAPA Gabriel Miró as well as parents, the general public and several teachers from Playas de Orihuela.
In addition to chanting slogans, many protestors took with them saucepans and ladles that they noisily used to good effect. There were also many children with banners, each with its own motto. From ‘The children of Orihuela deserve the best’ to ‘You don’t play with education’. There were people with cardboard signs that directly appealed to the President of the Government: ‘Pedro Sánchez. New school for Orihuela Costa. Our children are the future of Spain’.
One of the mothers acted as spokesperson to the media as she highlighted the shortcomings in the educational centres on the coast. “Children don’t even have something as simple as shaded areas when it is so hot. “They all have to be stuck in a classroom with many other children.”
She also denounced that there is no “preparation” available for those students who arrive with no knowledge of Spanish. “Such children find it even more difficult; they have no additional support to help them develop their language skills,” she said
The mother also denounced the lack of urgency afforded to the construction of this new centre, urgently required to lower the ratios in the two existing schools. “We have had to make this protest because it is the only way we can show our politicians that we are serious, and make them realise that we are super abandoned.” She also took the opportunity to demand greater and better maintenance of the playgrounds, just as she thanked the teachers for their efforts in trying to educate their children in such appalling circumstances and with such large classes.
Images courtesy of Peter Houghton
