France spends more on education than the average for OECD countries. And yet, the academic results of its students tend to deteriorate, in particular for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. This is the severe finding established by the Court of Auditors in a study called A more efficiently organized school serving students and published this Tuesday. Because if education remains the first item of State expenditure (110 billion euros in 2020), “40% of students at the end of primary school do not have the fundamental knowledge in reading and maths that would allow them to follow schooling in college under the right conditions ”, underlines the Court. And in 2018, 12% of students left high school without a diploma (CAP, BEP, Bac).
A finding that the Court of Auditors explains for different reasons, including “a much too centralized system”, which does not allow the adaptation of educational systems to local realities. “Only 10% of decisions taken in educational matters are taken at the level of the establishments, of which barely 2% in total autonomy”, note the Wise Men. Hence their recommendation to grant more autonomy to establishments, which they consider to be an important lever for efficiency.
More freedom in recruiting
This autonomy, according to the Wise Men, would allow each school, college or high school to have a school educational project and to strengthen the collective work of teachers around it. It would go through an evolution of the function of head of establishment: “We should switch from the manager to the team leader”, estimates the institution. This development would allow it to have more control over recruitment, as the Court explains: “In most OECD countries, teacher recruitment is local. The Court does not wish to completely call into question the national recruitment of teachers, but thinks that it is necessary to open more posts with profiles ”. That is to say, positions that require specific skills, to which teachers can apply without needing to prove that they have had a certain length of service in the profession.
Recommendations that go in the same direction as some of the measures adopted under the Macron five-year term. Chance of the calendar, the Parliament adopted definitively Monday evening the bill of the member LREM Cécile Rilhac which creates the function of principal of school in the primary. This text provides that school directors receive a specific management allowance and benefit from accelerated advancement, as well as a total or partial discharge from teaching depending on the number of classes and the specificities of the school. A provision introduced by the Senate organizes the principle of a “functional authority of school directors”, that is to say the possibility for them to be decision-makers on more subjects relating to the functioning of the school.
Macron and Pécresse in unison on the subject
During his visit to Marseille on September 2, Emmanuel Macron also announced an experiment in 50 “laboratory schools”. In these, the director will be able to “choose the teaching team”, in the words of the president. And this from the next school year. In addition, still from the next school year, 1st and 2nd degree teachers will be able to apply for profile positions (nicknamed PoP by the National Education). Among them, computer engineering, BTS fashion, horticulture or painting coating. But for the first year, there will be very few: 250 positions of this type will be open in the first degree. And in secondary education, “the number of positions offered is in line with the principle of an experiment,” says the ministry. Difficult to blur more.
Emmanuel Macron is not the only one in the political class to promote the autonomy of establishments. The LR presidential candidate, Valérie Pécresse, also wants more “autonomy” for schools, by creating “a new type of public school under contract, on the model of American charter schools”, which will also allow to “better pay teachers,” she said in October to Figaro.
Teachers’ unions wind up
But on the ground, the idea hardly appeals. The creation of a school principal is already making people cringe. The SNUipp refuses a statute “conferring on the direction a statute and a hierarchical role relating to a managerial conception” and wishes that the hierarchical superior of the teachers remain the inspector of the National Education of the district. “The functional authority can go very far, including in certain cases as far as granting the capacity to take disciplinary sanctions”, also estimates the Snalc.
The Marseille experiment does not appeal to the masses either. In September, 40 schools also signed a call to boycott this experiment, criticizing in particular the possibility of the choice of teachers by the school principal: “ This would oblige teachers throughout their careers to job interviews, helping to muzzle them to remain “recruitable” at their next transfer, “underlines the text. “In Sweden, the liberalization of schools on this model has led to a collapse in the quality of the education system. Finally, it is obviously an important step towards the privatization of national education and towards the breaking of the civil servant status, ”he continues. One thing is certain: the autonomy of establishments will inevitably be the subject of electoral debates. And they will be stormy.