Havana/In the program Round table From this Thursday, the education authorities, which until now had only offered fragments of the problem to the official press, finally recognized the magnitude of the delays in the preparations of the school year, which begins next Monday. The problem is particularly critical in the case of school uniformsof those who still have to make no less than 1.3 million pieces.
The figure was offered by Mirla Díaz Fonseca, president of the Light Industry Business Group (Gempil), who explained that the total demand for the 2025-2026 course was 3.6 million pieces, but it was only possible to finance the preparation of 2.3 million. The solution – one of which they have already assumed in past courses – was to return to the initial degrees, that is, those that begin a new level of teaching and, therefore, have no possibility of reusing the clothes of the previous one.
“We decided as other years prioritizing the initial grades because these children have no alternatives. It is true that it is very difficult in the degrees of continuity, that they will not have the uniform, it is difficult because they grow, fattening; then it becomes more complex,” said Díaz Fonseca.
The Minister of Education, on the other hand, admitted without surroundings: “This is the second course in which we do not manage, say, the uniforms of continuity, which begins to have a stronger effect on the family.” In fact, he acknowledged that only 20% of the registration will have new uniforms.
Nor are all the initial grades guaranteed: “Of the initial six degrees, only three,” he said. The rest, if everything is going as planned, could receive its first piece towards the end of October.
The clothing they get on their own must still stick to certain requirements, such as “respecting the colors of the educational level”
Throwing a strict rule of Cuban schools, the minister said that the use of the uniform has been “flexible” so that students who do not reach can attend without problems with another clothing to school. However, the clothing they get on their own must still stick to certain requirements, such as “respecting the colors of the educational level.”
“We know that for the Cuban family the uniform has an extraordinary symbolism. It is equity within the school; and also savings, because when you have the uniform – even when we have to wash from time to time – it is not the same to dress children every day with adequate clothes,” said the minister, romantizing the outfits.
But behind the symbolism is the economic reality. A recent one reportage Posted by 14ymedio He explained how this shortage feeds an informal market that has taken strength. In Matanzas, for example, school uniforms that should be sold in state stores to 75 pesos are resembled in groups of Telegram, Facebook and WhatsApp for figures ranging from 150 to 600 pesos, depending on the state, size and urgency. In Havana that figure can even triple.
The problems do not end there. In addition to the uniforms, the usual Lack of teachers In all the teachings and the closure of schools that do not mention educational institutions in the round table, as recognized by the Ministry itself, they are working with an “adjusted standard” of school supplies. Rolando Ruiz Peraza, General Director of Planning and Assurance of the portfolio, explained: “The term adjusted standard gives the idea that it is not ideal, but resolves.” Last year the students received only 50% of the notebooks and pencils. This year, the great improvement is that each student will receive two monthly pencils, although the notebooks will minimize.
14ymedio He checked this week the closure of a high school in Holguín, the Sanfield Dagoberto. 10 years ago, the school benefited from a capital reparation that, due to its current aspect, seems to have occurred. It is not clear if it was closed due to lack of students or its deterioration, but in any case, the closure has at least one positive point: the students will no longer be in the center of the area of consumption and sale of drugs in which the secondary school is nestled, on the border between the distributions Sanfield and Pueblo Nuevo.
/ 14ymedio
Maintenance works are precisely another of the sectors in which education has resort. According to official figures, only 350 of the 816 expected institutions have been completed, while 250 are in execution and the rest – in luck – will be intervened in the fourth quarter of the year.
The ruling party insists on highlighting the extra effort of workers and education workers to ensure that the course begins without setbacks; But their failure, added to the working conditions, account for the bad conditions and limited resources of the Ministry. The seamstresses, for example, have had their work hours to avoid the blackouts, renouncing their vacations and facing heat and lack of raw material.
The same blackouts, which in some provinces exceed 10 am, will be those that students experience in the classrooms. Even so, Education wants to implement programs that involve artificial intelligence and virtual platforms of study material to consult textbooks “at the time when the electric fluid allows it.”
“You have to greatly recognize the work of the seamstresses that in months like these, where families enjoy vacations, they have had to leave everything, suffering blackouts and all the needs that we are going to go to their job regardless of the time. When everyone takes advantage of electricity hours to perform domestic work, they leave their homes and go to the workshop,” he wrote at the foot of an article in Cubadebate A commentator cited by the authorities themselves at the round table.
The polygraphic was also praised, especially in the eastern provinces, where the impression of notebooks continues
The polygraphic was also praised, especially in the eastern provinces, where the impression of notebooks continues. The printing of notebooks gave rise to talk about textbooks, another of the products in deficit in schools. Taking into account the “improvement” plan of education – with which the content of the teaching programs -, those of the second group (second, fourth and eighth grades) in recent years, “they have already arrived in the country and are in the process of distribution”. Those of the third group are still in printing. Where they do not arrive on time, the old ones will be used and there will be methodological orientations so that teachers can “solve” with outdated books.
On Monday the course will begin. Some students will go with a new uniform, others with a recycled one, and many with what they have. The notebooks will be counted, the rationed pencils, and the teachers – the ones that there are – will have to deal once again with the scarcity and tiredness. Meanwhile, the authorities will continue to congratulate the “last effort.”
