Public opinion on education in Spain: between catastrophism and satisfaction

The article deals with citizen attitudes, opinions, and evaluations on the education system. Firstly, we review the main axes of the political and media debate on education, emphasizing both its negative bias and the rising relevance of the "quality" issue as frame from which other issues are interpreted. Secondly, we describe the image of education and the education system prevailing in public opinion. Finally, we contrast citizens' general evaluations of the state of education and their evaluations of the educational institutions about which they have direct knowledge and use experience. The partial dissociation between (satisfactory) experience and (more negative) image reveals the influence of political and media "catastrophism" on public opinion.