And here is the school, once again, on the front line. After the disappearance of Shemseddine, this 15-year-old student beaten to death by other young people in Viry-Châtillon in Essonne and the attack suffered by Samara, 13 years old, severely beaten in Montpellier, all eyes are on turn towards the educational institution shaken by this increase in violence or, at least, by significant disciplinary problems. Creation of a mobile national security team, establishment of disciplinary councils from primary school, deployment of supervisors around establishments, obligation to leave one’s cell phone in dedicated lockers at the entrance… In recent days, the government has announced several measures to try to calm the school climate. “Teachers, like doctors, emergency doctors or firefighters, are forced to take on all the ills of society head-on. They must face behaviors, comments, attitudes that were once less frequent,” explains Jean -Pierre Bellon, Director of the resource center and systemic studies against school bullying. This former philosophy professor signs a book, Reconnecting with authority at school: ten immediate steps (ed. ESF Human Sciences), to be published on May 16. Work in which he, in turn, suggests several avenues to follow. Interview.
L’Express: The last international report Pisa shows that France obtains very poor results in terms of school climate. For what reasons ?
Jean-Pierre Bellon: Indeed, today one in two high school students say that there is too much noise in their class and that they cannot hear correctly what the teacher is saying. Over the years, we have become accustomed to the chatter and lack of discipline that reign in our schools. And this with total indifference. Many teachers struggle to carry out their missions correctly, become exhausted and fail to try to create the necessary conditions to teach in a peaceful manner, but this situation does not seem to move anyone. It is time to stop thinking that the latter are responsible for this disorder and to put in place a series of measures, starting with a reform of the sanctions system.
Precisely, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced his desire to create disciplinary councils from primary school. An interesting avenue in your opinion?
If it is a question of applying in primary education what does not work in secondary education, there is no point. The disciplinary councils, organized in middle or high school, are similar to plethora of structures in which representatives of teachers, parents and students sit. This diversity of stakeholders does not help in decision-making and tends to paralyze everything. This is why one of the ten proposals that I make in my book consists of creating committees for monitoring and handling offenses responsible for calling the students concerned to account for certain of their comments or actions.
Which is not sufficiently the case today in secondary education?
A study showed that in France, half of the students receive one or more suspensions during the year, while in England and Spain this result is halved. Despite everything, we see that it does not work. The problem is that today we are faced with a dual system: the teacher, depending on his degree of patience or his own assessment of the situation, has the possibility of administering a punishment himself to a student who commits an infraction. But he can also rely on the head of the establishment who, at that moment, will determine the sanction himself. This unclear mode of operation can create a feeling of injustice among students. This is why we must review everything, starting by creating a list of clearly established offenses. It is then up to the teacher to point out attitudes that have no place in school. And finally, it is up to this famous commission for monitoring infractions to take over by applying sanctions itself.
Shouldn’t we act from the early years, well before entering 6th grade?
Of course. Even if the arrangements made in middle and high school are far from optimal, they at least have the merit of existing. Whereas at primary school level, it’s absolute vagueness: what can a teacher do when faced with an insolent, turbulent or even threatening student? What recourse does he have knowing that there is no school life, therefore no supervisors in the schools? The teachers manage, sometimes sending the student to their colleague, to another class, but that is not the solution. All schools should be able to rely on at least one supervisor. However, we are not taking this path since a thousand educational assistant positions have recently been eliminated.
“Revaluing the role of educational assistant”
The Minister of National Education Nicole Belloubet proposes forcing students to leave their cell phones in lockers at the entrance to establishments. What do you think ?
This measure seems urgent and essential to me. At the start of the 2017 school year, the then minister Jean-Michel Blanquer made the decision to ban cell phones in college. The problem is that it didn’t go any further and we stayed halfway. In the current text of the education code, the possibility of using lockers in which students leave their smartphones is described as an “interesting avenue”. However, in my opinion, the role of a minister is not to provide guidance but to enforce specific measures. If the telephone is prohibited on paper, it is always present in the pockets of students who do not hesitate to take it out and look at it as soon as the teacher’s back is turned. However, it is essential that adolescents leave the world of social networks as soon as they enter school to avoid screen interference.
The creation of a mobile national security team, made up of heads of establishments, psychologists or inspectors, and dispatched to the site in the event of an emergency, was also announced…
Why not, but, as far as I’m concerned, I would go a little further by providing high-risk establishments with security personnel inside and outside the premises to monitor the surrounding area. I am not talking about bringing the police into the school but just about providing the necessary means to protect students and staff. We apply it well in supermarkets, why not in schools? Contrary to what we sometimes hear, there is nothing reactionary about this proposal. It is all the more necessary as the number of attacks or threats against school principals has increased significantly in recent years, in particular because of parents of students who are sometimes very virulent. In the same way, we must succeed in moving beyond this eternal debate on surveillance cameras. In many European countries you have a video system in the corridors or in the classrooms and no one is upset about it. I don’t see the problem as long as it is done with respect for personal rights and the images are viewed only in the event of an incident, exactly as is done on public transport.
Are AEDs or education assistants capable, as the government suggests, of monitoring the areas around colleges themselves?
No, that’s not their role. On the other hand, their presence within establishments is very important. The old system put in place under the Popular Front by Minister Jean Zay was much more efficient than that of today. Those who were then called boarding school masters or day school supervisors were recruited mainly among future teachers. It was a sort of obligatory path to becoming a teacher. 20 years ago, Minister Luc Ferry made the decision to abolish this body which was replaced by less well paid professionals, with a much more precarious status and who are not necessarily dedicated to teaching. There is an urgent need to reform and upgrade the status of AEDs.
Haven’t we tended to turn a blind eye too much all these years?
Yes, we close our eyes, we let it happen, telling ourselves that the situation will eventually get better on its own. As someone who organizes training in schools all over France, I can tell you that you often just need to cross the playground to witness lots of incidents that should not be happening there. The other day, from the room on the second floor of a college in which I was working, I observed a group of boys who spent the entire quarter of an hour of recess hitting each other – one took in fact more than the others – until the bell rings. I’ll let you imagine how long it must have taken the professor to restore order! We often wrongly think that the courtyard is a space for socialization in which everything goes well, but it is a place of incredible tensions and conflicts where everything takes place outside the gaze of adults. It is this entire system that we need to review.
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