Points for entering public and concertada schools

In case you were wondering, here's the official point system that Catalunya uses for assigning spots at public schools:

First score these:	Points
The student has siblings that already attend the school or the parent works at the school	40
If the school is very near where the parent lives	30
or if the school is very near where the parent works	20
or the parent lives in the same municipality	10
When a parent is on welfare (renda mínima d'inserció).	10
When the student (or father, mother, guardian, a brother or sister) has a disability grade >= 33%	10

Only in the case of a tie, score these:	Points
Being part of a large family or being a single parent	15
Having a chronic or serious illness (including celiac)	10
The student’s parents or siblings are alumni of the school (new for this year)	5

One other thing to keep in mind is that many schools are required to reserve spots for immigrants (both foreign and local), so sometimes showing up in the middle of the year can work in your favor.

How to scam your kids into a concertada or public school

Concertata schools are highly sought-after in this area due to the fact that they are generally significantly cheaper than fully private schools. Since the government subsidizes them, they are required to accept students based on a point system that is supposed to favor the disadvantaged.

In typical Spanish fashion (actually it should be Mediterranean, since the Italians and Greeks also seem to be in love with picaresque techniques), what started with the best intentions has turned into an extremely unfair system where it’s basically impossible to get in unless you cheat.

The original idea was that if you live or work nearby, you get a number of points based on your proximity. Unfortunately proximity is just too easy to fake (if you have a friend living nearby, you just use their address during the application process), so it all comes down to the “tiebreakers”:

The best cheats I’ve seen so far:

• The “Fake Teacher” scam. You give the headmaster a cash bribe and they “hire” you as a teacher for a couple days. Your duties may include fixing computers, crosswalk guard, etc. Kids of teachers get 20 points right away, so you’re pretty much guaranteed a spot. This only works in concertada schools since public schools can’t hire random people off the street.
• The “Fake single parent”. You get 15 points if you kids are from a single parent household. Maybe you should wait until your kids are in school before you marry, or if you are desperate, a perhaps a divorce?
• The “Chronic disease” scam. You get 10 points if your kids suffer from a chronic disease. The disease of choice right now is celiac disease, so get a friendly doctor to diagnose your kid and you are all set.

Layoffs at HP in Sant Cugat

There’s been a lot of placards and graffiti appearing lately near AP7 and around the HP campus in Sant Cugat complaining about the recent layoff policy. Apparently HP has a goal of firing 5000 people in Europe this year, and they’ve been going about it in a somewhat sneaky way in Spain. According to this story, they’ve been firing 29 people each quarter in order to stay under the “collective dismissal” law, which would require them to negotiate with the unions.

The unions are understandably pissed off and it looks like a strike may be on the way…

My company went though a layoff binge back in 2008 and I remember the poisonous atmosphere this created for everyone, especially in the way things dragged on and on and no one knew who would be next.