TownCrier WebPaper » Education

CRISIS KEEPS KIDS IN SCHOOL

admin — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 22:57:02 +0000

One unexpected consequence of the current economic crisis is that more teenagers are staying on at school. Until now, Spain has had one of the EU's highest school drop-out rates but youngsters are beginning to realise that the more qualifications they have, the better the chance of finding a job. The unemployment figure for October - 2,818,026 - was the highest since April 1996 and some gloom-and-doom merchants predict it could top the four-million mark by the end of next year.

HAVE FUN LEARNING WITH U3A

admin — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 20:16:30 +0000

Retirement beginning to bore you? Liven up you life by going back to school at the U3A - University for the Third Age - in Fuengirola. Registration is now open at the Ark Christian Fellowship Hall, Las Rampas, from 11 am to 1 pm, on September 30th and October 2nd and 3rd. You can also register on Enrolment Day on October 6th. Courses range from Scrabble, Poetry, Health and Your Body, Computer Improvers Workshop, Spanish for Beginners, Patchwork, and Golden Age of Spain, just a few of the 40 courses on offer. One novelty this year is a series of talks on the Spanish Civil War, to be given by Muriel Pilkington from the Town Crier. Membership of the U3A costs 25 pounds and entitles members to participate in as many groups as they wish. More details are available on U3A's website: www.u3acostadelsol.org.

MORE ILLEGAL INTERNATIONAL SCHOOLS

admin — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 18:24:26 +0000

The case of the St Javier's International Nursery in Marbella, whose owner was recently arrested for running it illegally in unsafe and unhealthy conditions, has led the authorities to take a closer look at other international schools in the area. A local newspaper reported last Saturday that there are at least 12 international schools are operating in Malaga province, mainly in Mijas, Marbella and Estepona, without permission from the local authorities. They are generally nurseries but some teach up to the bachillerato level. The owner of St Javier's, a 40-year-old Spanish woman, had been running the school for 12 years without the regional educational authorities knowing about it. Police said that, among other things, she had not been paying social security or respecting the rights of the workers.

BASQUES REJECT LANGUAGE

admin — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 18:18:23 +0000

Figures show that the Basque regional government has spent €126 million euros so far this year - 4% more than last year - on promoting the Basque language when only 11.5% of the population speak it as their first language. The number of Basque speakers rose slightly between 2001 and 2006 but according to the company that carried out the survey, the Basque government's determination to impose the use of Basque in all government offices, hospitals and other public buildings, has created a rejection effect. A company spokesman said people are studying the language because they are being forced to do so, but they don't use it. Another problem is that there are several dialects which the Basque regional government has merged into one known as Batua, and many of the older people don't understand it. The spokesman said: "You can't go against the fact that we already have a communication tool, which is Spanish, a language that we all speak."

BOOKS ON THE BEACH

admin — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 10:10:21 +0000

Members of the Alberto Diaz de la Quintana theatre company in Malaga have come up with a novel way to encourage people, especially the young, to read more. This summer they will be visiting the city's beaches dressed up as characters out of well known books. They are currently masquerading as Captain Nemo and Neptune to get people to read Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues under the Sea. Actress Sandra Segura said: "You'd be surprised at the number of kids who take a book with them to the beach." People who can show the actors a book will get a small gift. Julia Luque, who coordinates the project, said: "The idea is to award readers and encourage the rest of the public to read on the beach."

BILINGUAL SCHOOLS PROGRAMME STARTS

admin — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 09:53:54 +0000

The Junta de Andalucia's Education Department announced last week that 80 new bilingual centres will come into operation across the region this coming academic year. In Malaga province, 16 primary and secondary schools will take part in the new bilingual education scheme, the so-called Plurilinguistic Development Plan, which will benefit some 40,000 students. Another 115 bilingual centres will join the plan the following academic year. English has been chosen by 70 of the centres, but seven have opted for French and three for German.

HOW FAST DOES A HORSE AND TRAP GO

admin — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 10:58:52 +0000

About 150 learner drivers gathered outside Traffic Headquarters in Madrid last Friday to protest questions they had been given in their written test the day before. They said their lessons had not prepared them to answer questions like: How long would it take a seven-year-old tractor to pass the ITV; what is a monocycle, and how much does using your lights increase your fuel consumption. But the one that really annoyed them was: At what speed does a horse and trap travel? Reporters later put that question to Traffic Authority boss Pere Navarro during a television interview and he couldn't answer it. Driving instructors were also up in arms because exactly the same questions were put to people taking the test in towns outside Madrid the next day, when the answers had already spread like wildfire on the internet during the previous day's protest.

FEWER STUDENTS GO ABROAD

admin — Mon, 26 May 2008 18:12:50 +0000

The University of Malaga (UMA) sends fewer students abroad than it receives from other European countries under the Erasmus student exchange programme. In the 2006-2007 university year, 419 UMA students studied abroad, while 580 came from the rest of Europe to study in Malaga. This university year, the figures were 460 and 600 respectively. UMA is also a popular choice for students from Latin America, the US and Canada. UMA's vice-rector for International Relations, María Cabello, said Malaga was a popular destination because of "the city's welcoming ambience, the hospitable nature of its people, UMA's academic quality and the fact that the number of students opting to study Spanish as a second language is growing year by year".

BRITISH KIDS HAVE TOUGHEST TIME

admin — Mon, 12 May 2008 18:37:47 +0000

The spokesman for the Malaga provincial government's intercultural affairs department said last Friday that British children have the hardest time adapting to local schools, because of the language barrier. He said this was because they are a "closed" group, who talk only among themselves and speak English at home. The 4,599 British children in schools in the province are the biggest group of foreign students, representing 17% of the total.

NOT ENOUGH CATALANS TO MERIT A SCHOOL

admin — Mon, 12 May 2008 18:23:29 +0000

The Madrid regional government announced last week that it will not be able to make a good a promise by regional president Esperanza Aguirre to open a Catalan school in the capital because of a lack of demand. Regional education councillor, Lucia Figar, said only 11 families had requested that their children be taught in Catalan next year. She said that as the requests corresponded to different levels the regional government would try to give the families an option by opening a section in an established school so that those who wanted to study in Catalan could do so. Sra Aguirre made her promise in response to plans by the Catalan regional government to make Catalan the main language in schools there, with Spanish being studied as a foreign language.