Antoni Vera's four attacks on the Catalan school

The educational language model is undergoing a period of accelerated transformation, marked by the set of measures promoted by the Government and, specifically, by the Department of Education under Antoni Vera. All of these initiatives have reopened the debate on the role of Catalan in education. From the implementation of the Linguistic Segregation Plan to the relaxation of the Catalan language requirement for teachers, and including the amendment to the Education Law (LEIB) to recognize Spanish as a language of instruction, the Executive's initiatives have generated strong controversy within the educational community. Although the Government maintains that these decisions reflect a desire to guarantee a balance between the two official languages, unions, teachers, and other organizations warn that they could accelerate the decline of Catalan within the education system. Linguistic Segregation Plan

The Catalan government has extended the Linguistic Segregation Plan for the 2025-2026 academic year. This initiative allows families to choose the language in which some subjects are taught (especially Spanish) in both primary and secondary education. This year, 20 schools, all of them state-subsidized, are participating, with more than 5,800 students, significantly more than the 2,300 students in the previous year (11 schools). To support this, the Ministry of Education has tripled its budget, increasing it from €1.15 million to almost €3.74 million to fund specialized teachers for language groups.

According to Minister Antoni Vera, the goal is for students to master both co-official languages ​​on equal terms. The initiative has sparked controversy and generated significant opposition within the educational community. Unions, teachers, and Catalan language advocacy groups warn that it favors the reduction of Catalan as a language of instruction, creates linguistic segregation, and primarily benefits private schools by allowing them to do what they already do: teach classes in Spanish.

Language choice at three years old

Another measure that has shaped the debate on schools in Catalan is the possibility for families to choose the language of instruction for their children when they begin formal education, especially in the fourth year of preschool. This 2025-2026 academic year, 80.52% of families (6,458) chose for their children to receive this initial instruction in Catalan, while 19.48% opted for Spanish, with significant regional differences (for example, greater support for Catalan in Menorca and Mallorca than in Ibiza and Formentera).

The choice is not an invention of the Catalan Government, but is enshrined and protected by current regulations. According to the Ministry of Education, this guarantees families' right to choose the language of primary instruction. Proponents of Catalan-language education see the data as evidence of social support for their model and the consensus in favor of the Catalan language as the language of education.

Spanish, language of instruction

The modification of the guiding principles of the LEIB The inclusion of Spanish as a language of instruction alongside Catalan has also generated controversy. This change, promoted within the framework of the 2025 budget agreement between the People's Party and Vox, has added a provision to Article 135 stipulating that both official languages ​​will be used as languages ​​of instruction. However, the Minister of Education, Antoni Vera, has reassured the educational community, stating that this reform will not affect school autonomy or existing language projects. According to Vera, schools wishing to continue teaching entirely in Catalan may do so, and neither the Minimum Standards Decree nor the Law on Linguistic Normalization will be altered. The formal inclusion of Spanish as a language of instruction has been presented as a regulatory matter, not as an imposition that will automatically change educational practice.

The Catalan government's position attempts to reconcile its commitment to Vox with the desire to maintain key elements of the current linguistic model, but the measure has been met with suspicion and criticism from organizations, unions, and left-wing parties. Meanwhile, the constant questioning of Catalan-language projects has led teachers who previously opposed them to openly challenge school-wide initiatives. Others, when no one is watching, teach their classes in Spanish.

Teachers without Catalan language requirement

The agreement between the People's Party (PP) and Vox eliminates the Catalan language requirement for teaching positions that are very difficult to fill. The measure, it has been argued, responds to the difficulty of filling vacancies in specific specialties and on islands like Ibiza and Formentera. In practice, this means that professionals without the required language level will be able to access these positions and begin working, with the commitment to demonstrate their proficiency later.

This change implies a profound alteration of the linguistic model: for the first time, it opens the door for tenured teachers without accredited knowledge of Catalan to teach in public schools. This jeopardizes the language projects of many schools, which could be weakened by the difficulty some teachers have in using their own language fluently. In fact, there are already substitute teachers working without understanding it. With this new step, the exception becomes the rule, and access to public service without the Catalan requirement is institutionalized.

More resources for linguistic integration

The Government has also promoted projects that aim to foster knowledge of the language, especially when welcoming newly arrived students. One of the main ones is the Strengthening the Linguistic and Cultural Reception Program (PALIC)The aim of this program is to facilitate the integration of students arriving from abroad through immersion in the Catalan language and knowledge of the surrounding area. The PALIC program becomes a fundamental tool to ensure that these students acquire sufficient linguistic competence to integrate into the educational system with a minimum level of success.

For the 2025-2026 academic year, the Catalan Ministry of Education increased the resources allocated to this program to 1,247 hours of language support, 233 more than the previous year. In just two years, the cumulative increase has been 516 hours, a figure that demonstrates the commitment to strengthening this program within secondary schools. However, despite efforts to ensure an initial welcome in Catalan, once integrated into mainstream classrooms, many students find themselves in an educational system that increasingly uses their native language less and less.