Barcelona is set to add 5,000 new adult Catalan course places from the 2026 to 2027 academic year, in a move aimed at cutting waiting lists across the city.
The agreement between Barcelona City Council and the Catalan government will raise the council’s contribution to the Consortium for Linguistic Normalisation’s Barcelona centre from €1.9 million to €3.1 million. That money will become part of the organisation’s permanent structural budget. The centre will also take on 23 more staff, bringing its workforce from 200 to 223. Annual Catalan course places in Barcelona will rise from 30,500 to 35,500.
Barcelona mayor Jaume Collboni said the aim is to reach “practically 100% of unmet demand”. He added that never before had so many Catalan courses been offered in the city. Francesc Xavier Vila, Catalan language policy secretary, described the deal as a “structural and permanent strengthening” of the system, saying the demand for Catalan needs a major response.
Marta Salicrú, Barcelona commissioner for the social use of Catalan, said waiting lists change through the year. She said there were about 2,000 people waiting in the first quarter and around 1,700 in the second. On that basis, she said 5,000 places should be enough to cover waiting list demand across the school year. She also said around 6% of waiting lists are normal, due to organisation and scheduling.
The plan sits within the Catalan government’s wider Plan to Promote Catalan, which includes more than 150,000 Catalan teaching and certification places at A1 and A2 level in the 2026 to 2027 academic year. That is about 50,000 more places than are currently available across Catalonia. Barcelona City Council joined the National Language Pact last September, and officials said this agreement matches its goals.
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Originally published by Catalan News - Politics. Read original article.
