The government of the Autonomous Community of Navarra (Spain) has withdrawn the financial agreements from the four schools that offered the New Single-Gender Education, based on the latest reform of the Spanish national education law.
Single-Gender Education, a family’s choice
The loss of the financial allocation makes the cost nonviable for many families of these schools, the governing bodies of which have decided to convert them into co-ed to preserve it. However, many families have vigorously protested this discrimination, which unfairly deprives them of a successful educational option and attacks the freedom of education and the right-duty of parents to the education of their children.
The unrest and protest has been channeled, among other ways, through articles in newspapers and other media. We collect, as an example, three of these letters, significant of the state of mind of many families in Navarra, as well as those from other parts of Spain that are in a similar situation.
We lack freedom
Teresa Goizueta Bicarregui
Published on 12/21/2023
In the 21st century, anyone would say that the title of this letter is impossible. As a former school student at Redín-Miravalles, and as a mother of Irabia-Izaga I want to denounce the attack on my freedom that I suffer and many parents suffer from the Government of Navarra. They have completed their persecution of parents who opt for single-gender and Christian education, forcing schools to become coeducational in a very short period of time. It is a shame that a right as basic as choosing the education of our children is violated in such a way.
The politicians must ensure the interests of all citizens, whether they voted for them or not. Single-gender education is an option as valid as mixed education and it is proven that it gives very good results. of performance. Note that these two Navarrese schools are year after year in the rankings of the best schools nationwide.
I take this opportunity to thank those responsible for Irabia-Izaga for always looking after the families and for carefully safeguarding the spirit of the School, which although it is now going to become coeducational, will remain intact and will reaffirm our choice. To the rulers, stop attacking our freedom and being sectarian. They will continue to attack everything that exudes freedom, values, truth and Christianity. It doesn’t matter, we will resist together.
Leave our children alone
M. Eulalia Martín-Algarra y Guillermo Lacarra Albizu
Published on 12/31/2023
From December 13th – When they told us that in order to maintain the government financial aid at our children’s school we had to leave single-gender education – until the morning of December 28th when we wrote, we could not help but have in our hearts the image of the bad characters in stories: the ogres who eat children, the witches who deceive them out of pure evil, the stepmothers who lock them up out of envy… All evil people who gratuitously prey on children to satisfy different whims, manipulating them and forcing them to submit to their arbitrary and miserable decisions.
The Government of Navarra is forcing the educational style of the Irabia-Izaga and Miravalles-El Redín schools to change, mercilessly harming a few thousand Navarrese children and adolescents. It seems that Don Pedro Sánchez, Doña Carmen Celaá, Doña María Chivite, Don Adolfo Araiz and their companions cannot stand us. They want to hit us where it hurts most, in our children, without taking into account what they are: innocent children and adolescents who study in schools that apply a specific pedagogical methodology, a methodology, not an ideology. Their evil head uses them as an excuse, without caring about harming children who study and learn serenely and happily.
However, today, as we reflect on the circumstances of the Holy Innocents’ Day and thinking that there are innocent people in every moment of history, we have come to a conclusion: reality is stranger than fiction. They are not evil people from stories, they are real people… The story of the innocents is repeated in different people and in different circumstances…
A bloodless story, it is true, but we cannot help but think that here in Navarra we have had our regional Herod, willing to sacrifice whatever is necessary in order not to lose her crown as president. They are not children under two years old and it is not Belén, in our case the range is expanded, from 6 to 18, and there are four locations: Irabia, Izaga, Miravalles, El Redín.
Or, isn’t losing your life losing your freedom? Pull them away from their school unilaterally because our regional Herods are bothered by an educational methodology… Or, is single-gender education something different from a pedagogical methodology? Isn’t it harmful to kids who have been studying at a school for six years and under specific conditions, that in the most important year of their academic life (2nd year of high school) they have to change location, change classmates, teachers, forced by circumstances beyond their control and their family’s control?
Isn’t it evil that children are seeing their parents suffer because of them? Isn’t it cruel to see children worrying about where they are going to go to school, in case they are going to be separated from their friends, and in case they are no longer going to be with those teachers they love so much? We are sure that thousands of parents in Navarra take responsibility for the suffering we are going through for our children. We think especially of those parents who take their children to schools where they also differentiate, that do not “segregate”, by language…, they surely take charge with special sensitivity.
And since we are at Christmas and it is a time of hope, we dream that it is possible that our particular Herods become Melchior, Gaspar Baltasar, the Olentzero, Saint Nicholas or Santa Claus, and this story, which I am not telling, ends well, and let them leave our children in peace.
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Navarra Diary: We lack freedom
Navarra Diary: Leave our children alone
The links and bold are ours
