Teachers at the Arthur Rimbaud college in Montpellier decided to go on strike this Monday, the start of the school year after two weeks of vacation in the Montpellier academy. They are protesting against the media treatment of the aggression in Samara and the lack of recognition of their investment, in particular by their supervisory authorities.
“We were all devastated by what happened in Samara, shocked to see that schoolchildren were capable of such violence. If we are relieved to know that his life is no longer in danger, we are obviously concerned about the physical and moral after-effects that inevitably result,” they explain in the preamble.
Before expressing their indignation at “the defamatory statements conveyed by the majority of the media and social networks, by Samara’s family and her lawyer, outraged by the accusatory silence of our ministry and by the political recovery which pays little attention of the truth and unfairly harm the reputation of our establishment.”
Young Samara, 13, was violently attacked when leaving her establishment on April 2. First falling into a coma, she was able to leave the hospital a week later, but was unable to go to her class on Monday. Two other students at the establishment are the subject of disciplinary proceedings. There are three teenagers, in total, to have been indicted in this case for “attempted voluntary homicide”.
Support from parent representatives
Sunday evening, the rector of the Montpellier academy nevertheless made a point, in a press release, of “thanking the educational community of the college which, despite the shock of the attack and the emotion it aroused and despite the media pressure, remained fully mobilized by providing lessons and welcoming students.”
She had renewed all her “confidence in the Arthur Rimbaud college teams: particularly committed women and men who carry out their profession with conviction in a rapidly changing neighborhood where specific means are mobilized to promote student success”. For their part, the parents of students delegated from the college also published a letter of support to the educational community.