Students left stranded without public transport to get to school in Murcia
ARCHIVED ARTICLE -
Protests as 6,000 students have been left without school transportation in towns across Murcia
There has been polemic over the start of the new school year in the Region of Murcia for the 2023/34 course as students have been left without public buses to be able to get to school.
Parents and children have been clamouring for the situation to be resolved as soon as possible, staging protests in the street and outside schools.
It is thought that as many as 6,000 students in the Region of Murcia still do not have this service to get to their educational centres, despite the fact that the school year started almost a month ago now.
The Regional Government in Murcia has assured that it is “working tirelessly” to restore all school transport routes “in the shortest time possible”.
However, there are questions over why the contract for the transport company was not organised sooner, especially given the fact that, in the words of the parliamentary representatives themselves, Murcia is the community in Spain with the “third highest budget for Education”.
In the meantime, the parents’ association has claimed that solutions are having to be “improvised”. In response to the crisis, parents have been taking it in turns to shuttle students to school in private vehicles.
This seems to go against the stated environmental aims of the Regional authorities and the affected towns to reduce private car use and to promote public transport as a green alternative
The parents’ association, FAMPA, is planning a joint gathering at 7pm this Thursday September 28 with students and workers in the educational sector outside the headquarters of the regional government in the Palacio de San Esteban in Murcia city to unblock the situation.
At the same time, they are taking the opportunity to call for schools and institutes to have “quality dining rooms and scholarships”, as well as getting rid of temporary huts for classrooms and hiring a greater number of teachers.