Verónica Maireles, 43 years old, studied translation and interpretation at the University of Granada and three years ago she switched to teaching to teach English in various centers in Catalonia. He currently works at the Joaquim Rubió i Ors institute, in Sant Boi de Llobregat (Barcelona), A clear reason; bureaucratic procedures: “Filling out reports, changing programming every year in accordance with an educational law that is constantly modified or dealing with families”, take him further and further away from his goal as a teacher. “Our working conditions are no longer as attractive as they once were; “Before, a teacher’s salary was a good salary, but today and, if we take into account the increase in the standard of living, our salary is quite mediocre.” And he argues another compelling reason: “The figure of the teacher has lost respect from all areas.”
Veronica is not an isolated case. . This is reflected in a survey published by the Ustec union (the majority in the sector), during the month of October. This questionnaire, which was answered in full by more than 10,000 public school teachers (8% of the total number of teachers in the Catalan public sphere), Xavier Díez, coordinator of the study, explained that the high percentage of teachers who are considering leaving their work is due to “a growing degradation of working conditions, a lack of definition of the educational system, an increasing work overload and a certain pedagogical chaos that results in no one knowing exactly how the school should function.”
increasing every day, is one of the pressures that teachers denounce. José Vila, 45, who teaches biology classes at the Vila Romana Institute in La Garriga (Barcelona), investigates this and states that “there is too much workload.” José says that, as a result of the pandemic, tasks that are not directly related to the main function of teachers have multiplied: teaching and preparing classes. It also affects , a section in which more and more is demanded of them. “We have more and more students with specific educational needs. Students must be treated with a different approach: with individualized tests, reports and evaluations.” All this, he adds, “has an impact on the schedule, with many hours of hidden work and a reconciliation with family life that becomes more complicated.”
The discontent extends to the healthcare field and, specifically, one of the most affected sectors is that of senior healthcare technicians. This is demonstrated by a survey by SIETeSS (State Union of Higher Health Technicians) that 400 technicians responded to out of the 5,000 in the entire Catalan territory. The average level of fatigue with the profession on a scale of 1 to 10 is 8.6 points. Some of the most frequently mentioned reasons are insufficient salaries, lack of professional recognition or excessive workload. And although few respond that they are considering looking for work abroad, a large majority argue that they have not considered it, but they are very dissatisfied.
Àlex Badenes is a senior health technician specialized in imaging for diagnosis and nuclear medicine. He works at , and begins his speech by advocating for the importance of these professionals within the health sector organization chart and asking for more recognition. Àlex bases his complaint on three main focuses: he assures that “in all the countries of the European Union, training in Medical Imaging and Radiotherapy (where, among others, subsequent technicians specialized in imaging for diagnosis and nuclear medicine are trained) is carried out through a university degree, while in Spain it is still a higher cycle” and adds that “there is a lack of hours of training and hours of practice”; Secondly, it demands a “reclassification of the category of senior health technicians”, since in the General State Budgets approved in 2008 they were assigned a classification group B, but they continue to be paid as if they were still from group C. ; Finally, he claims that “the improvements agreed upon in the third agreement () are disproportionate.” Àlex complains that of the total increase to improve the conditions of health personnel, of around 320 million annually, only 0.18% was allocated to senior technicians.
As a result of this agreement the sector, when future negotiations were agreed with the and the. Carmen Romero, a clinical laboratory technician for 25 years, explains that “last year, during the strike, there were twelve people on sick leave” at her hospital (Bellvitge Hospital). His colleagues, he confirms, “took leave due to stress and depression.” Carmen expresses that there are five technicians who have left and that she even has a colleague who has gone to work in a supermarket because she could not stand this situation of permanent tension any longer. Finally, he declares that he has considered leaving the profession and that, in fact, he has already sent two resumes.