Last Thursday February 25th, the President of the Valencian Government, in his speech announcing the measures to be applied from March onwards, recommended maintaining teaching activities on the working days of Fallas.

This recommendation, which was submitted to the Municipal School Councils, has also been passed on to the Valencian Public University System by the Valencian Regional Ministry for Public Health through the Ministry responsible for universities.  

On Monday March 1st, Principal Mª Vicenta Mestre met with the Executive Council to address this issue, among others. This resulted in the agreement to maintain the academic and working calendar throughout the traditional Fallas week, as planned.

The academic calendar, approved by the Government Council, is available here:

https://www.uv.es/graus/calendaris/Calendari_Academic_2020_21.pdf

Throughout Tuesday March 2nd, the UV principal has been in touch with the highest academic authorities of the other Valencian public universities to share the decisions agreed in each academic institution.

Thus, on Wednesday March 3rd, the UV principal, as the president on duty of the Conference of Valencian Principals, has conveyed to the Ministry responsible for universities the common decision of maintaining the Fallas public holidays as non-teaching days for the whole of the public university system.

The universities’ decision is related to two key factors: on the one hand, the modification of the working calendar involves negotiating and re-planning the university staff’s work. On the other hand, it also implies rescheduling the teaching activity of all the subjects affected in all the university degrees and postgraduate education. These changes therefore require a longer planning timeframe than the one proposed.

Vaccination of university staff

During Wednesday’s conversation, the principal reiterated to the Ministry for Universities the request she made in writing on 23 February, on behalf of all Valencian public universities: to consider the university staff in the vaccination process for all staff in the Valencian education system.

Since the first reports on the vaccination process in the Valencian Community, the UV principal, in the regular meetings between the principals and the Ministry of Universities, has reiterated how important is to consider university staff in the vaccination process together with the rest of the staff of the different stages of the Valencian education system.

In this regard, on 23 February, Principal Mª Vicenta Mestre sent this request in writing to the competent ministries for Health and Universities.

Along with the request, the rector of the University of Valencia placed the staff of the university medical offices undergoing the vaccination process at the service of the public health system.