How to improve Spanish education?

Before reading our last blog spot, we ought to inform that this report is not objective. In this report we want to talk about our offers to improve Spanish education based in our experience as students.

Resuming:

After twelve years of education, we think that we are qualified enough to offer different ways to the contemporary education system .

First of all, we think that the Spanish timetable is a big mistake specially the meal times, because we have lunch and have dinner too late ao our body does not work correctly.

Also we offer a new high-school schedule, in which instead of starting school at 8a.m and finishing it at 2p.m, so that when we arrive home we ought to do our out-of-school activities (sport, music, languages...) and homework, all these activities will be included in the school timeline. As a  consequence, the students ought to eat in the school but when they go out they have finished their homework, they have done their sport, music... This way, when students arrive at home they can enjoy and spend time as a family.

Spanish universities

Spain has a long history of higher education, with its oldest university, Universidad de Salamanca, dating back to 1218. Its higher education system was overhauled in 2007 to embrace the three-cycle system of the Bologna Process, ensuring compatibility with the European Higher Education Area (EHEA).

There are a total of 78 universities in Spain. 51 of them are run and founded by the state while 27 are private or run by the Catholic Church.

In Spain universities allow you to earn a bachelor’s, master’s or doctorate degree, depending on your personal preferences. There are requirements that you must meet in order to attend universities in Spain when you are an international student, including those related to admissions into the country as well as the particular university.

Admission to the Spanish university system is determined by the "nota de corte" that is achieved at the end of the two-year Bachillerato. The "nota de corte" is a combination of the mark achieved from the Bachillerato exams and the average mark obtained from the university selection exam, which is commonly known as "Selectividad".

If you pass selectivity you will enter the university and when you finish it, you will get your ''diploma''.

In addition to these official degrees or ''diplomas'', each university offers a wide range of unofficial degrees (MASTERS) as well as graduate programmes with a wide range of subjects which qualify for the award of the degree of Doctor.

COSTS: The price of public universities is between 2000 and 3500 euros for the whole education. Tuition in private universities is much higher. However, Spain is one of the cheapest countries in Europe.

Spanish univerties:

SPANISH UNIVERSITIES RANKING

Spain in the map:

In our society, when we talk about 'education' we hear countries as Finland, China, Sweden... But, what about Spain? Is it so bad as we think?

We have decided to do some research about the position of Spain in relation to education:

PISA studies' results:

• In Sciences the best countris are Singapur, Japan, Taiwan and Finland.
• In Maths the best countries are Singapur, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and Japan.
• In Reading the best countries are Singapur, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and Japan.

Where is Spain?
Spanish students are still struggling with Reading, Science and Maths despite all the money the country has spent on trying to improve its educational standards, the latest Pisa study results show the following scores:





The performance by the 2,709 Spanish students who participated in the program – which evaluated 85,000 youngsters from 44 countries – shows that they are less well prepared to tackle the problems of everyday life than their scores in Maths, Reading and Science would suggest.


The Spanish children of highly educated parents perform worse than expected, bringing the average down.


The PISA report notes that Spanish students seem unfamiliar with computer use, based on their digital reading scores.

EDUCATION SYSTEM:

Hello, today we are going to talk about the structure of Spanish education.

Structure of education system:




Once you have 16 years it is not compulsory to continue studying. As a consequence, we are going to talk until E.S.O.

Nursery/preschool in Spain

The first six years are divided into two stages.
-The first stage is nursery school, which takes children from around three months up to three years old, but it is not covered by the state.
-The second stage is preschool which takes children from three to six years old. Most children attend the three years of preschool education and develop their physical and mental skills. Children learn how to write and read the alphabet...
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Primary school

It is compulsory for children to attend primary school until the age of 12 making a total of six academic years. There are three cycles:

First cicle- 6–8 years
Second cicle- 8–10 years
Third cicle- 10–12 years


And these are the marks:
insuficiente (IN) – insufficient
suficiente (SU) – sufficient
bien (BI) – good
notable (NT) – very good
sobresaliente (SB) – outstanding

Children study Spanish language and literature, mathematics, natural and social sciences, arts, English, and in the 3rd cycle French and physical education.

You can chose whether or not you want your child to take religious (Catholic) education lessons when you join the school.


E.S.O (Compulsory secundary school)
E.S.O is the last compulsory stage of Spanish education. Normaly you change of building and you go to the secondary school. But in private or concerted school usually children do E.S.O there too.
In first of ESO you have social sciences, Spanish, maths, P.E, technology, religion or moral, arts, sciences, English and an hour with your tutor.

In second of ESO technology disappears and you have to do music and 'ciudadanía' which is a subject to learn how to behave in society.

In third of ESO sciences get divided in biology and geology and physics and chemistry. 'Ciudadanía' is replaced by technology.

At the end we found fourth of ESO when you decide if you want to study sciences ( biology and geology and physics and chemistry) or lettres (latin and economy), music and technology disappear and you get ready to continue your studies in Bachiller, or formative grades or you look for a job.

PRESENTATION

Hello,
We are Sara and Flora, two students of high school.
We are interesed in Spanish education because after a visit we have made to a French high school, where we saw the differences between Spanish and French education, we thought that our education ought to learn from other European countries.

As a result we have decided to give ideas and information about our education system.

We hope you will enjoy it.