What’s that Sound?

The newest results of the international PISA test in the Camino a Ítaca this week. Once again, excuses are made but the root cause is once again avoided. Click over to read the original article published in Spanish in el HOY or read the English version below. (PDF en castellano abajo)

The programmed ritual self-flagellation
has once again begun. The echoes of lashes reverberate throughout the country,
from the smallest of teacher’s rooms to the editorial pages of newspapers to
the highest offices of the Ministry of Education, as this devotional practice
of self-criticism runs its course.

The results of the PISA
test have been released and show that Spain has achieved its worse results
since testing began back in 2000. In this eighth edition of the global test,
690,000 students from 81 countries aged 15 and 16 participated, 30,800 of them
Spanish. The tests were conducted, with a one-year delay due to the pandemic,
in the spring of 2022 so the newest of the never-ending string of education
laws hadn’t fully come into effect.

Once again the flawed
Spanish education system demonstrated that the window dressing changes that
have been implemented towards a more competence based education system haven’t
made a difference. The law may have changed and will certainly change again,
but what is happening in classrooms across the country hasn’t.

The results have provoked
a mad rush to uncover reasons and to assign blame. In Catalonia they even went
so far as to release a xenophobic excuse that immigrants were overrepresented
in their case.

In this edition the format
of the math test changed again to become even more competency-based, one that
requires students to make a greater effort in reasoning and relating knowledge
in order to apply it to solving real life problems, which also certainly took
its toll on the results.

Reading comprehension is one
of the most basic skills, not because the OECD says so, but because it is the
essential stepping stone for other learning. It is a key competence for
educational inclusion, for the academic success of all students. This means
working with competences rather than simple mechanical practice in class and
the overwhelming load of homework Spanish kids receive is the way forward. The
excessive focus on rote learning and memorization so common in Spanish
classrooms is far past its sell by date.

But while the sounds of
flagellation still reverberate, they refuse to acknowledge the real root of the
problem. It’s almost like the Filipino Catholics or the Shiite Muslims in Iraq
who continue to practice self-flagelation woke up one day and began whipping
themselves only to realize that they had the wrong day marked on their
calendar. They’re completely missing the point.

You can make as many
changes as you want to the law but if you don’t change one of the fundamental
pillars of Spanish society, real change will never happen.

The elephant in the room
remains the opocisiones, the way that public employees are chosen. There is
nothing more medieval and anti-competence based than the public exam system
here in Spain and its presence can be felt in all levels of education, from
primary all the way up through University.

Consciously or
subconsciously, what teachers are preparing are opositores.

Teachers can’t be expected
to believe in and apply competence-based education when their very careers came
about due to an exam where they simply had to memorize and vomit a series of
topics.

Until this system changes
the whipping will never cease.