The use of Catalan plummets in the 2025 university entrance exams to levels seen 20 years ago

PalmThe University Entrance Exams (PAU) of June 2025 registered a significant decrease in the use of Catalan. Only 65.9% of the exams were answered in Catalan, a drop of 2.25 percentage points compared to the previous year, confirming the continuation of a trend that began in 2018. Until a few years ago, the presence of Catalan exceeded or was close to 80%, with a historical high of 82.6% in 2014. This proportion is now close to the values observed in 2004. Analyzing the historical series since 1992, one can observe how the use of Catalan in the PAU has gone through several cycles. In the early years, the percentage of exams in Catalan was very low, only 26.9% in 1992, and it increased year after year until reaching a peak of 82.6% in 2014. However, from 2015 onwards, a gradual decline began to be noticeable, more pronounced in recent years, coinciding with the measurement of the measure of the measure of the

The decline is observed on all the islands, with notable differences. In Menorca, students continue to be the most frequent users of Catalan (90.3%), while in Mallorca the percentage is 65.4%, with a significant disparity between Palma (49.3%) and the rest of the island (84.7%). In the Pitiusas Islands, Ibiza registers 44.4% and Formentera 100%, a difference marked by the low use of Catalan in private and semi-private schools in Ibiza, which has fallen from 24% in 2020 to 10.6% in 2025. In secondary schools, although the figures remain higher, they have also fallen from 2020 to 57.25% in 2025.

Choosing Spanish, easier than before

It's worth recalling that in the 2023 university entrance exams (PAU), the University of the Balearic Islands (UIB) facilitated the choice of language for the exams, providing the questions in both Catalan and Spanish, in response to an appeal from the PLIS Education collective. Until then, the questions were distributed primarily in Catalan, and students who wished to take the exam in Spanish had to request it from the supervising professors. With the new measure, professors must ask each student which language they prefer to use for the exam, thus guaranteeing the right to choose the official language in which to answer.

Despite this facilitation, the downward trend in the use of Catalan remains clear, especially in private and state-subsidized schools, and demonstrates a decline in Catalan's presence in students' language choices. Experts point out that although the option to choose is maintained, factors such as the social perception of the language, the influence of Spanish, and the educational policies of schools can influence this decision. This decline highlights a setback in the use of Catalan in the university entrance exams, which has returned to levels seen two decades ago, despite institutional efforts to promote its use and guarantee students' right to answer in either of the two official languages.