Education: Hope for newcomers in Europe
On the other hand, the budget for Compensatory Education was reduced substantially in 2015 and 2016. The effects of this reduction have in turn been exacerbated by staff reducing policies, as a result of which support hours in primary and secondary education have been largely reduced, as has the weight of orientation departments and professionals specialising in diversity,7 leading to an increased incidence of part-time employment and teacher rotation. Finally, resources for shared teachers and practical programmes and support required by the Compulsory Secondary Education Act have not been budgeted nor provided. These trends have had a considerable impact on the pupils as can be considered by the fact that against the background of early school leaving, the gap in this indicator between Spanish and foreign nationals has tended to widen, amounting to double for foreign nationals in 2013.
Policies in equity for education
Diversity policies According to the State School Board’s report on the Education System 2016, diversity policies are geared to pupils with specific needs of educational support owing to disability or serious behavioural disorders, high intellectual capacities, late integration in the education system, specific learning difficulties, or particular personal, socio-economic or academic conditions. The educational administrations define procedures that ordinary centres can use to identify such pupils and to detect special needs, and provide the resources, organisational forms, teachers and specific professionals, as well as curricular adaptations and cooperation agreements with other administrations and entities for appropriate care. In Compulsory Secondary Education, these general guidelines lead to the socalled performance and learning improvement programmes (known by the Spanish acronym (PMAR)), geared preferably to those pupils that show relevant learning difficulties not attributable to lack of studying or effort, the creation of new cycles for Basic Vocational Training and measures to promote staying in the educational system as well as opportunities to access and remain in the labour market, and the Youth Entrepreneurship and Employment Strategy 2013-2016.
7 Including specalists in Linked Classrooms, Compensatory Education, Special Education and Listening and Speech skills among others.
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