Does Spain have a catchment area system for public schools?

It’s likely that schools in Spain work differently to how they do back in your country, so you’ll want to do in-depth research before you arrive so that your children can transition smoothly.

As well as the challenge of having to learn a new language, you’ll have to first learn how enrolling your kids works and how to choose the best school for them.

One of the most common questions foreign parents have is if you can just pick any public school or if there is a catchment area system for state schools. After all, in many countries this determines where families choose to live.

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To make matters more complicated, the school system works slightly differently in each region in Spain too, as they’re each managed by a different education department.

The general rule across Spain is that families can choose any public school anywhere within their region, if there are spaces available.

The main exception is in Murcia, where you can only choose a public or private school within your municipality.

According to the recent study ‘Diversity and Freedom: Reducing School Segregation by Respecting the Ability to Choose School’ prepared by renowned Spanish business university Esade and NGO Save the Children, “Spain is among the countries with the highest levels of freedom of school choice”.

This is great news if you are looking for a school with certain types of values or one that might fit your child better than another one.

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Nevertheless, just because you can choose any school you want doesn’t mean that you’ll always get your first choice.

Does where you live make a difference?

Some colegios públicos (public schools) will have more potential applicants than there are spaces. In this case, a score system may be used to determine who gets the spot.

Generally, points are awarded for having a sibling at the school, proximity to your place of residence or a parent's workplace and income.

In these instances, it will be more advantageous to live near your preferred school, so in some ways there is a type of catchment area, but it's not defined.

Keep in mind though, each region has its own regulations on how their point systems work.

For example, according to Cynthia Martínez-Garrido, professor of Research Methods at Madrid's Autónoma University, schools in the capital region don’t place so much importance on proximity; siblings going to the same institution plays a much bigger role.

Madrid places a big emphasis on freedom of choice and allows all children to select wherever they want, regardless of catchment area, socioeconomic status or other.

In Andalusia, proximity is more highly valued, though. If your home nearer to the school, you'll receive fourteen points, and ten if it's within the bordering area. In the case of proximity to the parents' workplace, ten points if it's within the same area, and six if it's within the bordering area.

Most regions in Spain - except for La Rioja, the Basque Country and Valencia - use what’s known as the Boston mechanism. This is the algorithm that makes the school assignment system give greater importance to families' first choice. So this again, could be more important than where you live.

As mentioned though, you won’t always be given your first choice, so it’s key to keep your options open.

Timing is also an important factor on deciding if you’ll get your child into your first choice school, not only proximity.

For example, in Catalonia, to be admitted to a publicly funded school for the first time, or to change schools, you must pre-register. This application is submitted a few months before the start of the school year, usually between March and April.

So if you don’t get this application in at the right time or are moving to Spain later on in the year, then it might not matter if you live near a school or not, it will only matter if they have available places.

According to the Catalan education system “School places are allocated first through a points system (based on proximity to the school, financial and family circumstances, etc.) and then through a lottery if there is more demand than supply of places at a school”.

To sum up, it will help if you live nearer to your preferred school, but it's not always the most important factor and it will greatly depend on which region you live in too.

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