Call for Madrid infant-educator demo

Infant-education workers in Madrid kept an indefinite strike in place on Thursday after a meeting with the regional government ended without a settlement, extending a labor dispute that began on April 7. Protesters also gathered outside Alcalá 31, in central Madrid, during a week of mobilizations tied to the stoppage. Organizers said they would press ahead with a state demonstration in Madrid on Saturday after the talks showed no immediate breakthrough. Mercedes Zarzalejo, Madrid’s regional education minister, met representatives of the Plataforma Laboral de Escuelas Infantiles, or PLEI, on May 21 as the strike entered its seventh week, according to El Periódico de España. The platform, backed by CGT, has been sustaining the strike in schools serving children aged 0 to 3. Before the meeting, workers told the newspaper they did not believe the strike would be called off. (epe.es) ### Why were workers back on the street at Alcalá 31? Alcalá 31 was the site of a Thursday protest outside the regional culture, tourism and sport department building, elDiario de Madrid reported. The gathering formed part of a broader week of protests linked to the indefinite strike that started on April 7. (epe.es) El Salto reported that Madrid workers have been on strike since April 7 and that a separate state-level stoppage took place on May 7. The outlet said buses were expected to arrive in Madrid from across Spain for Saturday’s march, which organizers presented as a call for improvements both for children and for the professionals who work with them. (eldiariodemadrid.es) ### What did the regional government offer? Around 400 public-network nursery schools in the Madrid region will progressively have two educators per classroom, one of the demands raised by striking workers, El Periódico de España reported later on Thursday after the meeting. The arrangement, known as the “pareja educativa,” already operates in schools directly managed by the region and would be extended to indirectly managed centers under the commitment described by the paper. (elsaltodiario.com) The same report said the commitment was conveyed by Zarzalejo during her meeting with PLEI representatives. The article did not describe the broader dispute as resolved, and earlier reporting from the same day said the strike remained active after the talks. ### Who is organizing the wider Madrid demonstration? PLEI and allied workers called the state demonstration in Madrid after weeks of stoppages, El Salto reported. (epe.es) A separate elDiario de Madrid report published on May 17 said a May 23 protest in Madrid had been promoted at state level by CCOO to demand labor improvements in the 0-to-3 education cycle. The two reports describe the same weekend of mobilization but attribute the call to different organizing structures, reflecting the overlap of groups active in the dispute. May 7 was the date of an earlier state-level strike that expanded the Madrid dispute to the rest of Spain, according to El Periódico de España. That report said as many as 60,000 educators nationwide were called to join stoppages around the same demands. ### How long has the dispute been building? April 7 was the first day of the indefinite strike in Madrid’s infant-education sector, according to El Periódico de España. (elsaltodiario.com) At the start of the stoppage, workers said they were seeking conditions they considered necessary to guarantee what they called a quality education, while one organizer said the sector was already in a “situación límite,” or limit situation. (epe.es) May 24 is the next public milestone in the dispute, with organizers expecting demonstrators from across Spain to gather in Madrid. El Salto said buses were due from different parts of the country, and Thursday’s protest at Alcalá 31 showed that the regional strike remained active heading into the weekend. (elsaltodiario.com) (epe.es)