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Catalan teachers demand 34,000 more staff to resume negotiations
The unions keeping the dispute alive have called a teachers' strike for 26 November and a demonstration on the 21st. Their demands include 34,000 additional workers and changes to class sizes and schools.
The teachers’ survey gathered almost 33,000 responses and sets the pace for the November protests
The survey that established the priorities gathered almost 33,000 responses: a third of the teaching census took part, and the figure is half that of last year’s surveys. This limited support also explains the protest calendar, which is more restrained than at the end of the previous school year.
The unions are maintaining calls for gatherings at schools on 4 November and their participation in the general strike on the 11th. They are also planning a demonstration on the 21st and an education strike on 26 November 2026.
34,000 more staff and lower ratios
The main demand is to increase staff by 34,000, including teachers and educational support staff. Within this, the unions are asking for 16,225 more teachers—five per school—and 18,000 additional permanent positions for inclusive education.
They are also calling for students with special needs to count double when calculating ratios. This measure would affect both students who are vulnerable for economic reasons and those with disorders or disabilities. For educational support, they propose bringing the vetlladors service in-house: these are the monitors who support students with disorders and are currently managed by external organisations.
The list includes a salary guarantee clause so that pay rises in line with the IPC. It calls for reduced bureaucracy and greater investment in school infrastructure. It also demands teacher participation in curriculum reforms and measures to protect and promote Catalan.
Disagreement with Education remains unresolved
Ustec, CGT e Intersindical made the proposals public on Wednesday, after presenting them on Saturday at the Asamblea Educativa de Cataluña. The priorities came from a form distributed among teachers at assemblies since the start of the school year.
The unions maintain that the Departamento de Educación has not implemented most of the measures agreed last year. They refer to the two agreements signed with CC OO y UGT, as well as Profesores de Secundario. The other organisations rejected them as insufficient and called for continued negotiations.
The agreements included a salary increase of 400 euros per month over four years, 5,000 new staff positions, and 50 euros for overnight stays during school trips. The Education Minister, Esther Niubó, has on several occasions ruled out reopening talks: she believes the agreements exhausted the available margin and that teachers did not have a clear roadmap.
A dispute also over the power of school management
Among the proposals is reducing the autonomy of schools and the power of their management. To this end, the unions propose repealing the decrees on Autonomy, Dirección y Plantillas, a measure that distances them from school heads.
The survey also reflects doubts about maintaining the pace of strikes seen at the end of last year, which had already started with a strike that was losing momentum. Only 50% of respondents said they were willing to support new strikes; among them, the vast majority preferred to limit this to one or two days.