Since 2016, different works have been carried out so that the more than 500 students who attend the Carande Carro school can have classes normally. After five years, the construction of the new building advanced up to 30%. The Province decided to terminate the contract with the company Construcciones Espacio-Servicio SRL and look for a new one to complete the tasks.
“the work is suspended”, he confirmed to CORDOBA PROFILE the deputy director of Infrastructure of the provincial Ministry of Education, José Peralta, who this Wednesday was at the educational institution to form, together with teachers, parents and students, the new Work Monitoring Commission that will be carried out by another company.
“We have mutually terminated the contract with the contractor due to the non-progress of the work. On July 24, with the new company hired, we will bring the plan to finish the remaining 70% of the building, which has 35% executed. By the end of this year, the school has to be finished, ”he specified.
In the meeting with the director of IPEM, Laura Frini, which was also attended by mothers, teachers and students, Peralta acknowledged that the work should have been completed in March of this year: “We cannot ignore that the deadlines are all expired due to different variables, such as the pandemic, the economic crisis, or perhaps due to a company without financial support”.
In the last session of 2022, the Córdoba Legislature declared the “emergency of the infrastructure of state-run educational establishments in the province, until December 31, 2023” and the creation of a special fund to cover expenses. of works.
This instrument also allows the Province to contract directly with the company that will assume the execution of the remainder of the work on the new building at the end of July.
More than half of the students have classes in a shed
“Since March of this year, the nine courses of the 4th, 5th and 6th year oriented cycle of the morning shift, of the Natural Sciences and Economics and Administration orientations, study in this new part,” said director Frini.
The other students, who are more than half of the student body, continue to have classes in a rented shed 200 meters from the school grounds. But they all have Physical Education at the Las Rosas Neighborhood Center, more than a kilometer from the institution’s land.
The authority explained that this shed is a “field school” made in 2020 with Durlock walls and bathrooms in containers. “They are small spaces and we have up to 30 students in the classrooms”, he recounted.
History of broken promises
In 2015, in the year of the 30th anniversary of IPEM 190, the demands of the educational community began to be stronger due to the serious deficiencies of the infrastructure and a land for a new school building was formally requested.
The following year a series of renovations were carried out and the Ministry of Education undertook to design and plan a new structure. But everything was stagnant.
There began the sit-ins and demonstrations by boys and girlsand the interventions of the Education authorities of the Municipality of Carlos Paz and the councilors to demand that the Province speed up the times.
There were twists and turns with several unfulfilled promises, until in June 2019 the first part of the work on the new building began on the historic school grounds. While the work was being carried out, the students had classes in the old classrooms in very precarious conditions.
In November 2019, the students decided to take over the school and no classes were taught because the work had been paralyzed. The ministry intervened again, the school was closed completely and the old structure was demolished.
That time the promise was that the new building would be finished in 14 months. In other words, for the start of the 2021 school year. However, the coronavirus pandemic changed all plans.
In February and March 2020, prior to the health emergency, students began classes in rented sheds on Calle Atenas at 60. They only had to endure one more year. But everything was postponed due to Covid-19, including the long-awaited new structure.
2021 passed and 2022 passed, but the work advanced a quarter of what was promised. Meanwhile, the 550 students had classes at the “campaign school” that Education arranged in two sheds.
2023 arrived and the rush of the company Construcciones Espacio-Servicio SRL, by Héctor Penna, to complete a wing of the new building to move to several courses, given the decision of the owner of one of the sheds not to renew the rental contract.
For some reason, the construction company could not continue and the ministry had to take charge -with the intervention of a public notary- of the execution of the work so that some courses could start the school year in one wing of the building, even with several deficiencies still to resolve. Now the Province promises the completed work by the end of 2023.
The most beautiful stage in an abnormal secondary
The students who between 2015 and 2019 entered the IPEM 190 Carande Carro secondary school will complete their secondary level studies after spending six years fighting for better infrastructure conditions.
All of them will have had the experience of participating in sit-ins, court cuts, demonstrations, takeovers, and other types of claims before the school authorities, Infrastructure personnel from the Ministry of Education, and the company in charge of the work.
“It is very sad to live this reality. I see my friends in other schools that have decent buildings and take classes normally. My normality during these years was to see my school fall apart, have classes in a shed and then move around in the middle of the construction site.”, recounted Azul, a sixth-year student, to CORDOBA PROFILE.
The “campaign school” was a provisional instance for a year, but it’s been four years: “It fell apart, currently the walls are broken, the ceilings are falling and there are leaks in the bathrooms of the containers.”
Asked about the educational quality that she could have had in these years, the adolescent assured that all the broken promises “affected the educational level that we could have had.”
And he added: “In a fixed and dignified place you can have quality classes, without worrying that a contingency may occur. In the sheds the teacher cannot be heard because, as the walls are made of Durlock, the noise from the classrooms next door is heard. So everything is very difficult”.