Workshop | Towards new perspectives in school

Audio description [AD]: The participating group gathers in the main room after the workshops. Ignacio Calderón addresses them.

Ignacio Calderón:This short half-hour assembly is to bring everyone up to speed on what happened in the workshops we weren't in. So, the spokespersons for each workshop will come up here and tell us a bit about the conclusions they reached and the discussions that arose in each of the workshops.

Alejandro Calleja:—Hello, good afternoon. In workshop 3, we've been comparing the legislative aspect, where we come from and where we are. This afternoon, we will delve into where we want to go, where we are going. So, there was a cascade, a brainstorm. I haven't counted them, but there were about forty-something initiatives that we've summarized into eight.

The first, somewhat as a headline, is "unclear and contradictory regulations." They generate confusion among professionals and families themselves. The lack of knowledge is tremendous. And, furthermore, contradictory in the sense that they don't truly align with legislation. The legislation is illegal because, if discrimination, rejection, abandonment, mistreatment, segregation, exclusion, and the civil-social death sentence of students are permitted, it is illegal according to the Convention and human rights, of course, and, evidently, we are still dealing with it.

These are regulations based on the clinical model. The regulations rely on labeling, as we've already discussed. In the end, the student is labeled, and the families are labeled too; we are all labeled.

Then, "helplessness," logically the family, when this tsunami hits them. They are already coming from a very strong emotional tsunami, and when these problems hit you out of the blue, you are totally helpless. You don't expect the blow, and such a tsunami hits you that surviving is almost impossible. "Resilience," which I learned from Nacho. After this whole process, believing yourself a survivor is truly a tremendous merit, given all you have to go through and suffer: your own lack of understanding, that of others, even of your immediate circle, which is why personal, family, and community support is so important. We will see this later.

Then, the legal aspect generates many fears due to the issue of "costs." The issue of threats, logically. You are always between a rock and a hard place. If you confront the Administration, the established power, the norm, then they threaten you with social services, they threaten you with reporting you, they threaten you with breaking up the family, they threaten you because you are a bad parent and "how can you do that for your child." So, fear and threats, logically, greatly affect families and it is an abuse of power. Actually, we are in "legality over illegality."

The absence of actions for discrimination is a bit what I was commenting on in the workshop, it's a bit about access. Families, besides being honest, have to appear to be so, because professionals, even if they are not honest, can afford not to appear honest and nothing happens. I have experienced that personally. But families have to be honest and appear to be so. When battles that can be proven are won, some responsibility, there must be something.

The "lack of budgetary transparency" in controlling educational criticisms. The usual song and dance: there's no money, there are not enough resources. What are you telling me, if the World Bank report from the OECD says that special education is very expensive, in costs and results? Look, you're saying there are no resources? The resources you are using for segregated education, for mainstream education, you'll see there are resources for everyone. Besides, we will be creating students, people, with rights, dignity, autonomy, and independence. It will be, over a lifetime, much cheaper than telling a student at 21: "Here, take this kick and get out." And where do we go from here? Without any official study, without any official qualification, all this for what? We have to invest and we have to spend, let's be clear about things.

The problem for the Administration will not be the associations. The problem for the Administration could be families, independent families who unite, and when September arrives, instead of one "crazy" family, 20 or 30 families gather here in Andalusia at the Ministry of Education, because our children are not going to go to segregated centers.

And then, well, "the absence of both families and professionals" of the norms, of the laws, of the right. I think it's a somewhat deceptive ignorance, because it's possible that the Administration, between quotes, is not interested in us knowing that we have rights. And for them to tell you that your child has to go to a certain center and you tell them: "The child's right is not that." Likewise, the Administration is not interested in telling you: "These are your rights and this is the Convention."

And that's all we've seen so far. Thank you. And of course, something better will arrive this afternoon.

(Applause)

Arasy González:— Well, multiple ideas emerged from our debate, which we tried to group into different large categories. After releasing these mini-ideas and grouping them, we tried to find, among everyone, an origin for the school's problems, and we realized that everything is actually interconnected and that we could start explaining the diagram from anywhere, although I feel more confident starting from the left.

We understand that there is an education law. An education law that, broadly speaking, is quite inclusive, but something happens in the concretization of that law, something happens that makes the school become segregating, so, what happens? We find that there is a very specific organizational structure of the school, as some colleagues said. The school is focused not on forming active, independent, and democratic citizens, but on forming workers, which translates into an educational project without a mission and without a vision. Taking into account that the educational purpose of the school is to train these workers, it is totally focused on productivity, on academicism, it is a closed school, a rigid school, a one-size-fits-all t-shirt, where certain people enter and the majority are excluded in one or more aspects.

All of this translates into adopting and assuming a specific methodology, which also includes very closed, very specific lesson plans, focused solely on obedience, on student submission, on control, on order, and on having a student model that has to fit into that specific methodology. One of the examples we gave before finishing is that the school is seen as a cubicle where boys and girls are separated from their peers. So, it is normal for the teacher's role to translate into responding to small problems. Children with disabilities are not seen as a problem, which is a problem that, in the end, must be dealt with.

Well, that methodology inevitably leads to a type of evaluation, which is more of a grade than an assessment, that has to do with an alphanumeric data point, with a number that implies segregation, implies separation and a hierarchy, where one is more than another and there are standards that must be met. What colleagues said is that we need an evaluation for social justice, evaluation instead of grading, and that what the school pursues, taking into account the principles we talked about, is academic excellence rather than inclusion or generating competent citizens.

Well, all of this is seen and concretized in a very particular educational culture and practice, in which the teacher lacks attitude, willingness, motivation, and does not leave their comfort zone. This last sticky note, we added it at the end, and it is that we notice that there is a lack of social cohesion in the school. Without that sense of social fabric, everyone understands that the problems are their own, and that each person has to take care of them.

Another point that is closely related to school culture and practice is teacher training. The training for teaching staff, which we discussed earlier, has a high deficit related to the exclusionary society we are immersed in.

The ones who pay the price are the families. Taking into account that in a closed, inert environment that excludes other participating agents, the family is the one that suffers the consequences. This translates into families being part of a mechanism, a hierarchy, in which teachers come first, with the status of experts; then, there are the lucky parents; and finally, there are the boys and girls.

(Applause)

Leonor:—Well, our group was the second workshop, psychopedagogical assessment. We also did a brainstorming session regarding psychopedagogical assessment, what it's for, and put it under scrutiny. In this regard, we grouped all the post-its and then grouped them by assigning a category to each of those groups of post-its. The categories were those listed on the paper: labels, cooperation, and the functions and limitations of adaptations. In the group, we addressed all the issues that my colleague just raised. Psychopedagogical assessment is part of the processes and actions we carry out in schools, and we guidance counselors, who organize them, are involved and are part of all those circumstances my colleague has described.

What did we highlight, focusing mainly on the problems? I felt like contributing proposals and solutions that are also in our minds, and positive experiences, which there are also. Focusing on the problems, we cannot ignore that the clinical, segregating, and exclusionary model is very present in psychopedagogical assessment right now. Some guidance counselors have the same feeling as families, needing to be very technical, with rigor in terms of diagnostic categories; to assign a resource that closely matches that label. This is very present, and it's an effort that we guidance counselors must make to remember for each of our actions why we assess, with what purpose we assess, and as I said in the group earlier, we must not forget that we work for and by the students, and in that work, we are here to benefit them and help them based on the needs they present.

It was also mentioned that the reports were very standardized, that one report was a photocopy of another. In these reports, the context is forgotten, it is decontextualized, the child is viewed as sick.

Psychopedagogical assessment has gone from being a process to being something prescriptive, to assign a resource, they would say: 'Let's assign children to use this resource,' instead of the other way around, having needs and seeing what resource we can offer those students. The process and the usefulness of psychopedagogical assessment have thus been distorted.

We talk about cooperation because it also seemed noteworthy to us that in these psychopedagogical assessments, the solitary figure of the guidance counselor, alone, determined as a technician or clinician what the need, or disability, or diagnosis, that label was. In many cases, the opinion of families, or the observations of the tutor, who also does their own assessment and knows the students, are not taken into account. The assessments focus on that moment when you administer tests, decontextualized and without cooperation among the stakeholders involved.

I don't know if I'm missing anything else. I told my colleagues to help me out, I don't know if anyone from the group wants to comment.

Susana Fajardo:— We had discussed the issue of cooperation, how unfair it seems that, after doing work that should, in principle, be positive and necessary, such as assessing a child's needs so that those needs are met in the educational environment, we find that it is then up to the teacher to decide whether or not to pay attention, and whether or not to implement the proposal.

Another thing we had discussed regarding adaptations and limitations is that the system itself is corrupted by labeling students. What we achieve is that if we have distorted the very process that was supposed to be that assessment, and we only carry it out to produce a report that will likely be exclusionary, because otherwise, the child probably won't even be assessed, we are corrupting the system, and the report and the assessment are becoming defenders of the system's own corruption. So, instead of being a tool to meet needs, it is becoming a tool for segregation, and one that the entire administration relies on to decide which child gets in and which child doesn't.

So, obviously, another thing to keep very much in mind is that it is impossible, with the current ratio of guidance counselors, for this process to be carried out as it was intended. Just as ACIS (curricular adaptations) were not intended to segregate, but to ensure that students acquired certain objectives, now, if the ACIS means that your child has a two-year deficit, they are a clear candidate to have the door open, as it has been almost since they entered, to leave the mainstream education system. So, everything is very involved and very connected. The psycho-educational study is necessary if we are going to use it to meet needs, but if we are looking for a report, the report is what is dispensable, it is not necessary at all. If we are going to use psycho-educational assessment to segregate a child, the psycho-educational study will also be dispensable.

(Applause)

Ignacio Calderón :— I would add, just to point out one thing, regarding our workshop on the school as a whole, that what you are discussing in your workshop has to do with something that perhaps we have not addressed sufficiently, which is levels, the leveled school, the idea that a child at a certain age must be in this grade, but if they do not meet certain requirements, they do not have to be in that grade, or they do not have to be in that center or in that classroom. We will have to think about what is happening there for us to have understood that the school is above any child.

Alejandro Calleja:— Regarding exams and reports, we also address this in the legal aspect. Legally, we saw the need for a report. There must be a report to assess that each child has different needs, requires different support, and this must be evaluated. What we consider totally illegal and dispensable is the school placement ruling, because a ruling is legally a sentence. In the case of our children, it is a social death sentence; there cannot be a yes or no option, it has to be yes, period.

(Applause)

Leonor:—I would like to say something that I mentioned earlier in the group. Another thing I take into account, and I think it's important to name or mention, is that in that feeling we have of being technical, of being rigorous, of adjusting and being very precise in our work regarding needs and resources, and being very exact in the case we are evaluating. I believe we cannot forget subjectivity, just as we educators work in education and have a significant subjective component when we are working. However, this subjectivity should not imply a lack of rigor or that we are not doing our job well. Furthermore, I believe it is essential as long as it benefits the children and is focused on what they need and their well-being. I think that part, which is the heart we talked about, can never be missing, and it certainly contributes to doing a good job.

(Applause)

Inma (student):—I wanted to add that, in my group, we discussed the importance given to what is being evaluated. If we evaluate rigid rules like 'arriving to class, sitting down, and being quiet,' and if that is considered correct, supposedly correct, because if a child doesn't do it, and it already requires an evaluation, what are we really evaluating?

(Applause)

Irene Carranza:—I wanted to say that the psycho-pedagogical report is also a warning, in the sense that it identifies special educational needs. We analyze that the regulations themselves are based on a clinical model, part of the LOE (Organic Law of Education), and that the guarantee of certain aids and resources is based on this labeling. That is what I see as perverting the whole issue. So, I think the report also adheres to this clinical model, because it seems to be the guide to guarantee a right that the child already has. The label is not necessary; it's a double-edged sword.

Then, we also analyze that everything behind this in the school (referring to the workshop 1 poster). The regulations are also based on this whole model: how students are graded, how they are assessed, how the curriculum is designed, what the school's organizational regulations are. All these issues, which belong to how the entire educational institution is legislated, also respond to a segregating model, and it is at the root of all mechanisms of exclusion. In the end, guidance is just another pillar of all these segregating structures, by design.

(Applause)

Participant 6:—I think that, among the problems found in this area, one of them is the form of assessment. A team is assessing the children. When I went for my son's assessment, there was a team of people who didn't know him at all, who had never been with him. They hadn't even spent half an afternoon with him, and they were evaluating a child at a specific moment from which not much can be drawn. It's ten minutes, fifteen minutes, or half an hour, and that gives you no information. You are sentencing a child with incomplete information. So, I think the problem is that it has to be assessed differently. We'll look at the options later. Assessment needs to change; it shouldn't be done in that environment which is unknown to the child. They arrive at a place they don't know, where they are being scrutinized.

(Applause)

Raúl López:—To build on what has already been said, when conducting psychoeducational assessments, it depends heavily on the system we are in and how we understand education. In one of the schools I worked with last year, in an inclusive school, I received requests for psychoeducational assessments for 2% of the student body; if there were 100 students, that's 2, and they were for obtaining resources and scholarships. In segregating schools, the supposed need for psychoeducational assessments was 20% per classroom.

Depending on the system, it is selected what type of student is susceptible to being evaluated or not. I mentioned that, in a farm school, the most susceptible to being evaluated would be the shyest, those who don't dare to ride a horse, those who don't get their hands into bread dough, but the one who is very extroverted and has a very high kinetic-expressive ability is one of the best and most admired. However, in school, it is the disruptive and problematic ones who require strategies to get them to sit still and be quiet; this is where the school's behavioral modification responses come in, because we want them to adapt to a system, instead of the system adapting to the different types of personalities we have.

(Applause)

Virginia:—I want to speak based on what that mother said, when a child they don't know is evaluated. A note. In my son's evaluation, they considered it a problem because he really likes Disney and Pixar, and he's thirteen years old. Instead of discussing what he likes about Disney and Pixar, it was mentioned twice in the evaluation; they didn't bother to understand that my thirteen-year-old son doesn't just like Disney and Pixar, he knows who founded Pixar, that Disney bought Marvel, or who the producers of each movie are. They just thought he was younger because he likes Disney and Pixar, but they didn't bother to get to know him. He tried to tell the evaluator what interested him, and for her, it's a problem that my son knows the producers, the musicals, what one and the other do. He starts writing scripts, which for him is a passion, for her it's a major disability.

Ignacio Calderón:—Often, it seems that it has nothing to do with knowing the person, but rather the opposite.

Susana Fajardo:—Two little things I had forgotten and I think are important. The issue of evaluation, of coordination. It was mentioned before that the psycho-pedagogical report was not just the work of the counselor, but of the tutor with the families, etc., but as my colleague mentioned, there is often not enough time for these meetings to happen. It is very difficult to reach an agreement, teachers have more and more paperwork, and therefore what is truly important is being set aside: that the child does not progress due to a lot of administrative paperwork.

Another thing we have also discussed and which I think is important is that, often, students without a label are not counted for resources, so students who currently do not have a label are forced, in a way, to find a problem so that they can obtain a resource.

Ignacio Calderón:—Thank you all very much. I think in all of them you can see something, or perhaps it's just me who has a bit of a strange eye. It is clear that something that is a social process, which is what has been discussed here since nine in the morning. The problems are social, but in the three areas we have worked in, in the three workshops, what we have come to understand is how the school has the means to turn them into individual problems; these social problems become personal.

Let's take a break, we're going back to the workshops. We're going to continue working, now on how we can respond to these workshops. There are two workshops where we need to continue working to organize all these issues and we will continue thinking about what solutions we can offer to the problems we have generated in each of these workshops, okay? After that, we'll meet again, we have an hour and a half to think about possible solutions in those workshops. Come on.

Audio description [AD]:—The participating group stays in the main room for a while, chatting and exchanging opinions. Afterwards, they disperse to the different assigned classrooms to continue with the selected workshops. Meanwhile, the camera remains in the main room, focusing on the participants of the first workshop titled "What happens in the school where some children don't fit? Solutions".

— Cristóbal Gómez:"If we are going to put all these ideas into a tree, we have to structure it. It seemed that the essence was the organizational structure, which perhaps we can place in the trunk.

The idea we have is to provide solutions, but three types of solutions. We already have the problem. Global solutions for everyone don't work; let's focus on the solutions that are within our reach, what each of us – counselors, families, teachers, and others – can do, what is within our hands. Then, we will look for others that we can influence, and set aside those that are not within our hands, because there are realities to accept or live with in contradiction. In this case, there are ways to participate, either politically or through voting. When we propose a solution, let's see if we think about it from these three areas: those that are within our hands, those we can influence and how, and those that are a bit beyond us.

Ignacio Calderón:—Regarding the problems we have been working on this morning, we need to give them another thought. The idea we propose is that to visualize these problems, we have made a very simple design that serves to understand which problems are fundamental and which are symptomatic.

These problems we have seen are related. There are problems that cause other problems, and we can place them at the root of the tree; there are problems that are more symptomatic, meaning they are caused by others, but do not cause other problems themselves; and finally, there are other problems that, more or less, have a balance between what they cause and what causes them, do I make myself clear or not?

That is, if we can say that one problem causes another, we indicate it with an arrow. Now we can think: those that receive the most arrows are the symptomatic ones, those from which more arrows come out are the Gordian knots, the important ones. So, if we are capable of attacking these nodes down here (the roots of the tree), as Cristóbal said, having the capacity to work on that, it is important to attack these because they cause other problems.

So, let's get to that task now. First, to think about those problems we have been discussing, which are the fundamental ones and which are the symptomatic ones, and then, to think about what solutions we find for each of those problems.

Estela Martín:—I see education more as a cog within the economic and political system. We are educated to work, to be productive; therefore, for me, that is the root of the problem.

Cristóbal Gómez:—That is the ultimate conclusion we had to reach. Perhaps we should look for solutions elsewhere, although, perhaps, that change must be made at the deep root that also needs to be addressed, and which has a political, ideological, external to the school, social reason. We must never lose sight of it, because otherwise we are talking about technical issues.

Ignacio Calderón:—I would say it is from outside the school, but also from within the school, because as a teacher, every time I am working with my students as if they were workers, I am doing it, I am building, I am inventing, even if it is a mandate that comes from outside.

There are many ways to be teachers in schools too, and it is still the same school with the same mandate.

Estela Martín:—There are democratic schools and schools that are not. Also, there are teachers who use school to create critical thinking, and there are those who use it for submission.

Participant 1:— From the teacher's point of view, I ask myself: what can I do? When a teacher's methodology is focused on getting students to reach the top of a mountain, then, those students start walking and many fall by the wayside, they can't climb it, only a certain number of students reach that summit. So, there must be a change in attitude on the part of the teacher, and that change can be a change in methodology. Since there is a lot of competitiveness in the classroom in the end, it's about being the first to arrive individually. If we change that, and the topic of cooperative work, which is so obvious, is very much in vogue, but, to really carry it out, and realize that their role changes, and that those students who have fallen behind should not be timed, not only by the teacher, but by their own classmates, and make their classmates, who are only focused on climbing the mountain, stop for a moment and say: “This is teamwork, and we all have to climb together, in the end we will all take a little longer, some will reach the top, and others will get this far, but we will ensure that all these boys and girls give their best.” In a way, it's about changing the methodology, changing that way of thinking, which, although it seems very obvious, is not being implemented in the classroom.

Participant 2:— I think the basis is in the concept of education that she was talking about, a concept of education where the roles, in a traditional school, are very different from an inclusive school. The teacher's role changes completely when you give the child full access to their capabilities, and the child's role also changes. So, I think one of the problems I would point out is the concept of education and the established roles. That's the basis, because it has a solution. The solution is to work on initial training, work through methodology, work on it with families.

Ignacio Calderón:— I would say that, to pinpoint the problem that has no solution, the problem is the problem, then we think about the solution, but, right now, let's pinpoint it.

Participant 3:— Initially, the problem was discussed by saying that there was no true educational community. I am somewhat in favor of an educational community without hierarchy, without the teaching staff, families, and students being at the top, but rather that we can all learn from each other. In terms of the counselor's perspective, thinking that one can also learn from parents' perspectives. We should not start from the premise that the counselor knows everything because they have been trained. The individuality of each child will be able to contribute a lot to the family. So, it's a bit about that, that it is a true educational community, we can all contribute by adding.

Ignacio Calderón:— So, is the problem, and is the solution? Because you are providing both.

Participant 3:— The solution is to change our perspective, both for the teacher who can learn from the reality of parents, not just that they are in possession of the truth, and, on the other hand, for parents to be able to change their perspective towards the teacher, from judging whether they are doing it well or badly. To change everyone's perspective, so that it is a true educational community, where we all contribute, and then to consider the child.

Audio description [AD]: The camera leaves the classroom and tours the faculty facilities until it reaches the classroom where the second workshop is taking place. Meanwhile, the group continues to dialogue in the room.

Participant 4:— So, the control of the context, of the circumstances in which the child finds themselves, is in the hands of the counselor or the teacher.

Participant 5:—But if it is not formally regulated, we go back to the same old thing: do I do it or not? I can have my classroom, and he can come and tell me: ‘You have to set up the classroom like this, because you have this child with characteristics that might be better if they are organized in groups instead of individually’ or ‘The two chatterboxes who are best friends, put them at opposite ends of the room.’ And what do they do all day? Get up? I’ll put them together, let them talk their fill, I don’t want them flitting around the classroom. So this is not mandatory.

Raúl López:—I said I would do it, I can do it. Another thing is whether I am heard or not.

Esther Polo:—There may be two aspects. The legal aspect, which would be positive, in which we cannot infer, and another, the aspect in which we can infer, although not personally control, which would be the intermediate color.

Raúl López—: That’s where my proposals came from.

Participant 8:— As guidance counselors, we can also make proposals to the delegation to change this, so that the opinions and evaluations change. I believe it is also our obligation as guidance counselors.

Antonio Márquez :— I wanted to connect with what you are discussing, and I think one more point is missing, which is the concept of barriers to participation. When the guidance counselor, together with the teacher —and this changes the perspective—, considers that the teacher is the one who ultimately has the power to decide in the classroom, if both value the context, not only of corners or spaces but also the didactic and methodological context, as well as the proposals generated in the classroom, such as classroom plans, activities, and groupings, and we confront that with the needs not only of one student, but of all students in the classroom, then, based on that union, we think about the concept of barriers to participation. What we have to do from the psychoeducational report, according to the classroom proposal that exists with this teacher and this group of students, is to consider that this and this proposal that you are presenting exclude this and this student, so we propose this and this alternative. That, I believe, is the key to psychoeducational reports: offering alternative systems to break down barriers to participation.

Participant 4:— From what you said, about whether it happens in a classroom or not, I think the psychoeducational evaluation would not be done there, simply because it occurs in a specific situation, and a psychoeducational evaluation is a slow and careful process so that it is not just repeated in one situation, do you understand me?

Antonio Márquez: —But I'm not talking; it's the same, it's the same process. It's about, when you're in an initial evaluation, at the beginning, let's agree with all the teachers, and let everyone put their work proposals on the table, and let's also see which students those proposals are aimed at. And let the psychoeducational evaluation report truly serve as guidance for that teacher with whom, together with him, I will work; it's not something just for me as a guidance counselor, but rather we both see that the didactic proposal they have for the course might leave certain students out, and we propose alternatives. In other words, if I am a teacher who has this system, and I really like using this stimulus and so on, I might be leaving out a student who misses this stimulus, so offer them an alternative. I'm not saying your alternative isn't useful, but rather that you propose a double option so that students have the opportunity to choose, then we will be breaking down many barriers to participation. This, moreover, is in the Index for Inclusion; it's what we are trying to do, change the perspective, to focus not on needs but on seeking barriers to participation. I believe both are necessary because, if I don't know the student's needs, I can't know the barriers I will encounter in my classroom either, so I have to confront both.

Participant 4:— That is orange then.

Antonio Márquez: Of course, that's why I said it needs to be changed in color, because I absolutely need the teacher's participation.

Participant 4:— Information and inclusion originate from the teacher, even if the law specifies it. If, in the end, the teacher doesn't want to, they won't implement inclusion in the classroom.

Raúl López:— The problem, or lack thereof, will be entirely different depending on how the context is organized. If I want them to read in silence for an hour, I already know which children will have problems.

Participant 9:—I, there, don't see that the problem is psychopedagogical evaluations. I think what matters, there, is that the teacher knows their students, simply. Not evaluating everyone, and at all times or anything like that.

Finding out about the child's family situation, but without a diagnostic criterion or anything like that, just in a human way.

Susana Fajardo:—That tutors worry about the students

Participant 9:—Without looking for 'this one is missing this or that or needs this or that'.

Susana Fajardo:—There, we return to voluntariness, what we call empathy or having the desire, having that feeling that makes me want all my students to progress.

Participant 4:—That's part of the training. I'm in my second year of a Pedagogy degree, and that part is touched upon very little.

Leonor:—It happens to me, and forgive me for extrapolating too much to the personal, to my own experience. In all that you are bringing up or reflecting on, it happens to me that, in my own experience, when I've had the worst times or under the greatest pressure, I've suffered it more from teachers than from families. I've always felt closer to families, even much more drastic from the teacher than from the Administration, because the Administration is the norm, it constrains us sometimes because it's sometimes interpretable, and depending on how you interpret it, it has many loopholes, but I think it gives us room to offer solutions and offer beautiful things to students, and that it allows us to bring all these ideas forward. What is true is that there are wonderful teachers, but there are teachers who expect that specific role from the counselor. What they seek is to initiate the entire protocol, fill out all the documentation, which in my province are five or six documents, all with a deadline, and once it's filled out, for the counselor to see it. They expect that, and that when you see it, you give them the resolutions and the magic wand. That's where the powerlessness lies. I can't do anything alone; I need us to sit down, to truly form a working team to detect what we need, or how we value this process, or how we benefit the entire context and all the children, and what is happening that we cannot or feel unable to support this student. So, you sometimes encounter those barriers and many other pressures, and it's a matter of resisting and conveying that model to them a bit. Defending the other stance, returning reports with a different vision, defining the context more.

There, we also get into time limitations, and sometimes I also think that counselors are forced to train more, or we are forced in practice to adapt to everyone with whom we ultimately interact at school, because otherwise, you don't "adapt" for communication and a good relationship. When you clash with a teacher who is showing you something you don't agree with and you believe the way forward is different, you want to turn around and say: "I can't do anything with this person." To avoid this, you need to have a series of tools to adapt.

Raúl López:—The word "adapt" scares me a lot when it means giving up rights.

Leonor:— When I say 'adapt,' I mean knowing how to turn around what that teacher does when they won't budge. How to turn it around and come back another day, and get the conversation going again. Adapt in that sense, to finally be able to understand each other.

Participant 7:— I'd like to insist on something I think is very important. I keep insisting, as we've discussed before, that in schools we are not clinicians; we are teachers, counselors, not clinicians. Our job when doing an assessment is not to issue a report and diagnose; that is a task that, if necessary, should be done by another professional. The school's role is to determine the students' needs, how we can meet them, and to foster learning and, therefore, development, in each and every person at the school. Therefore, our job is not to diagnose; the exam is not necessary, nor is making a diagnosis. If we need to know how to modify contexts so that learning and, therefore, development can occur within them, that should be our job. The word 'diagnosis'... it's not our job.

Esther Polo:— I think we're getting a little off-topic again, so let's try to get back and focus on solutions.

Participant 7:— The important thing in the solution is the context.

Esther Polo:— Whatever comes up, even if we are talking in a fluid way, let's jot it down, especially to keep track of it and visualize it all, so that we can all see it. Anyway, she (pointing to her colleague) is writing down all the ideas that come up.

Susana Fajardo:— I think my colleague has said one of the key words that we can all agree on, families, specialists, and teachers alike: resist. It's about resisting invitations, resisting the teacher who doesn't want to, resisting the ruling, resisting and strengthening yourself, transmitting your message, because it's no use keeping it to ourselves.

Leonor:— Because it's no use, I've had the experience. It cost me my health, and it cost me a 3-month leave, which I didn't want, because I said: 'I can't take leave because the work will pile up and when I come back, what am I going to do?' The doctor told me: 'Girl, you're in your third trimester, forget about it and rest.' So, it cost me my health. I, intelligently, don't want it to cost me my health again. I've had to learn how to face all these pressures, all these challenges. It's very difficult not to let it cost you your health and still be effective in your job. That's why I say I empathize a lot with families, I've always empathized with them. It's not because I've had certain circumstances, it's because in my work with children, I put myself in the parents' shoes. Now I'm a mother, I have two young children, and the situations we deal with at school affect me even more. So, I consider it fundamental. Subjectivity is there to benefit the children in all cases, and when we don't benefit the children, we are applying a subjectivity that is very questionable and that we don't want to question, and we want to base ourselves on the ruling, and on the technical and rigorous.

Susana Fajardo:— But here we do have to find solutions, since we are a mixed group of families, I, in a way, don't have to... Beyond saying that what you are doing is not benefiting my son, I can't say that to a teacher. We, as a family, have solutions to improve or stop, and there are two, they are legal, because it won't depend on us whether a ruling is made or an ACIS is applied.

Leonor:— I believe that families need to be much more involved in the process, just as we lack coordination, time, space, and meetings from the context. There is no space, so we do it by approaching them in the classroom in the hallway, during recess, in spare moments, and we do it as best we can. We families need to be included in the process. We have a starting interview and a final interview, to provide feedback on that information, stipulated in the protocol. It depends a lot on how you conduct that interview, what attitude and predisposition you show, how you will attend to those families, whether you act as a technician who reads reports, 'this is what it is, I'm reading you the sentence and so on,' and the parents sign or not, or if you establish a dialogue with the family from the beginning. And I think those two prescriptive meetings are insufficient, and that throughout the process, if I am evaluating and seeing things, I should provide information as we evaluate. The problem is that this implies a much slower and more collaborative evaluation process; we always have time constraints. Evaluation needs to be a slow process, and we're rushing, and if you don't do it, 'this child is referred in the first trimester,' and June arrives, and you haven't seen them. We always have that limitation.

Rosario Barea:— I think that with the resources we have today, it doesn't have to be an in-person meeting; it could be via email, via telephone, there's Skype. They say 'there are two meetings and they are prescriptive,' but if there's willingness, in a little while, if you're leaving the child's school, don't rush to get in the car, I'm not going to do anything to you, an interview to provide feedback can happen at any time, and it doesn't have to be a trimester later when it no longer makes sense to meet, because sometimes feedback and reinforcement should be given gradually, not when the trimester has already passed.

Audio description [AD]: The camera leaves the classroom of the second workshop and moves through the faculty facilities until it reaches the classroom where the third workshop, 'Legal Barriers,' is taking place.

Alejandro Calleja:— I wanted to conclude by emphasizing the importance of associations. Lately, an association of parents seeking inclusive education has emerged, and this needs to spread and make the path more complex.

Ana Solsona:— And what good is it if you don't address the legal aspects?

Alejandro Calleja : Regarding the legal aspects, we'll see there's a strong step, which is what I want to analyze next. Empowering families through a network is fundamental. There are professionals, we need to communicate, talk, that's what we're here for. When you start to empower yourself and say you have rights, they tell you they're going to send you to social services. Families need to know. Based on our experience, we have a report from the State Attorney General's Office, which states that a family cannot be sued by the Administration for defending their children's right to inclusive education, something so obvious, but it happened to us.

J. Antonio Vicente:— They threatened us too.

Alejandro Calleja:— We were indicted and prosecuted.

Ana Solsona:—They even demand money from you.

Alejandro Calleja:Yes, it was a four-thousand-euro bail, and even with the possibility of losing parental custody. The Administration cannot threaten you for defending our children's human right to inclusive education.

Ana Solsona:—Let's be practical, what happens if I experience a violation of rights, what do the associations do? When a specific person has a problem, someone should support that person to the death, with enthusiasm. We associations haven't done that until now.

Alejandro Calleja:One of the preliminary solutions is that, as soon as you have a ruling for combined or special schooling, you can immediately send a form, scanning that ruling, to the United Nations committee, denouncing a violation of articles 7 and 22, because that's the reality.

Ana Solsona:— And is that so?

Alejandro Calleja: Yes, I had a meeting with the Committee with Carmen, last year, and we've been in contact since then.

Virginia:— And where is that committee located?

Alejandro Calleja: It's in Geneva. You send them an email and they respond quickly. It's very effective because the reprimands don't come from the bottom up, as they usually do, but from the top of the Administration. The communication through the committee is against the Spanish government.

(Everyone speaks at once)

Carmen Máximo:— I understand families perfectly when they spoke of teachers as if they were the opposing side. My proposal is that the fight must be collective, involving the entire educational community. Therefore, spaces like this should be used to create networks and share the information we are working on. I work in an educational center; that information can be put on the guidance website. We cannot separate families, teachers, and students; we are not factions, we are not in conflict. All of us who defend inclusion are among the teaching staff, the students, and among the families; we are not one or the other.

Ana Solsona:— But I ask myself, who takes a stand?

Carmen Máximo:— Some people do take a stand.

(Everyone speaks at once)

Carmen Máximo:— What I mean is that, even though it may seem like there are no professionals pushing for change, there are committed people who want a change within the paradigm. And if it's not visible, what isn't seen doesn't exist. My proposal is that this space serve to create a network of contacts that expands, and that information like what Alejandro is providing, and which I had no idea about, can be shared. And that the professionals and people within the education system can give families who come to us that information. I always have hope, and I don't think the system can be changed; it has to be changed.

Fran (student) :— It relates to the previous proposal about associationism.

Carmen Máximo: But that movement is more political, because life is political, it's a structure we talk about that sustains all of this. That real system dominates relationships, and therefore, we have to politicize ourselves as subjects to realize that we are part of that channel, and many people see this through their own experience or the experience of people close to them.

Irene Carranza: I propose compensatory measures for groups of families that do not have an association or the means to know their rights, not only at an informational level, but also to act more effectively with certain groups who have their rights violated and have fewer resources.

Another proposal I make is an increase in the budget. That would be out of control, but an increase in the education budget and resources that would allow the inclusion of all students in mainstream schools.

Since this is out of control, another more accessible option is to reach a basic allocation, even if it is very basic, in all schools, and that it does not depend on the number of students with certain labels, but rather on a series of other factors that are not so individual. For example, the context in which the school is located. A basic allocation not dependent on children's labels.

Another proposal, although with the basic allocation it would no longer be necessary, would be to eliminate the reports, if there were a basic allocation and measures in mainstream settings that allowed for attention, reports would not be necessary, because if there were an educational assistant in all schools, a report would not be needed to take you to the school where there is an assistant.

Virginia— Forgive me, but what you are saying seems almost utopian to me.

Sabina Habegger:Out of control, right?

Irene Carranza : Budgets are out of control, but basic funding can be influenced.

J. Antonio Vicente:— Excuse me, but the initial premise is that a budget increase is needed, we don't stop to think that perhaps the budget is being misused.

(They all speak at once)

Sabina Habegger:— Optimize resources.

Irene Carranza:— It's not so much about optimizing as prioritizing. Where do I place it, in bilingual sections, which are proven to segregate, or in specialized resources, which are proven to help inclusion?

(everyone speaks at once)

Irene Carranza:—A new psycho-pedagogical evaluation standard, through that basic provision. There could be a new standard. In Asturias, last year, enrollment in specialized centers could not be done without family authorization. Write it into a standard, into an operational guideline for guidance.

Audio description [AD]:The camera leaves the classroom where the workshop is taking place and tours the faculty facilities until it reaches the classroom for the first workshop.

Arasy González:—… The teacher, if they don't become aware during their initial or ongoing training period, or at some point, is not performing their teaching function well. He or she is enacting a specific policy in the very way they are present in the classroom. How are they present, how do they relate to the children, how do they manage time? They are a political being who makes policy. Politics is not separate from the educational center.

Therefore, if they do not become aware of that function or role, if they do not see themselves embodied as political agents, the teacher's ethics are inherent, they cannot be separated, they are not an add-on, and then the leg is hobbling. I don't think it's a lack of attitude, nor that they lack values or solidarity, no, because that must be present as a substantial part of what a teacher is. If that's not there, it means the teacher is missing a leg, they are hobbling.

(Everyone speaks at once)

Ainhoa Yáñez:I, responding a bit to you, return to the previous topic of working with the collective, whatever the school may be. You said something very important…