PalmMarga Prohens' Government will create a Baccalaureate of Excellence –a name chosen by themselves, with all the ideological baggage it implies– and will establish a specific institute to gather the “excellent” students there. It is hard to find a more anti-pedagogical initiative. Or worse still, a more profoundly reactionary one.
For decades, the educational world has been working towards an inclusive school. Immense efforts have been invested in integrating students with more difficulties, in avoiding segregation by social origin, by abilities, by language, or by economic situation. It is understood that coexistence among different people enriches everyone, that school is not just a place to acquire knowledge, but also a space to learn to live with others. And now it turns out that we must separate the “excellent” ones.
What exactly is an excellent student? The one who gets better grades? The one who memorizes more? The one who fits better within a specific evaluation system? And what about the student brilliant in creativity, artistic sensitivity, or emotional intelligence, but mediocre in a Physics exam? What about students who need more time or more support?
School, like society, should include both those who excel in academic skills and those who excel due to the difficulties they have to overcome every day. There must be specific attention, reinforcement, and stimuli for everyone. So that no one is left behind, so that no one is left behind. But this must be done within the same human ecosystem, not by building watertight compartments. Because ghettos are always a bad idea. Whether they are created by poverty or by privilege.
This Institute of Excellence is reminiscent of those gated communities where the richest isolate themselves from reality to avoid being contaminated by the rest of the world. Or those first-class train carriages where a person's value seems to depend on the ticket they can afford. It is an educational model that aligns with elitism, with a profoundly classist idea of society, and with that old scent of a school for the chosen few, so characteristic of certain confessional and conservative circles. An Opus Dei model, to put it plainly and simply.
Honestly, these adolescents turned into official children of excellence are somewhat pathetic. Poor excellent students. They will miss out on one of life's most valuable experiences: growing up amidst diversity. Sharing a classroom with those who think differently, with those who have different paces, with those who come from other worlds. Learning that intelligence doesn't always guarantee top marks and that there are essential lessons that aren't on the final exams.
Perhaps they will have impeccable grades, but it's also possible they'll be a bit off-putting, educated within the comfortable bubble of knowing they've been selected. And a decent democracy cannot educate its youth with the idea that there are first-class and second-class citizens. This isn't about separating the best. It's about guaranteeing opportunities so that everyone can go as far as they are capable.
