The standoff continues between the State and the Lille Averroès high school. The prefect of the North has decided to end the contract linking these two parties, thus ceasing to subsidize the main Muslim high school in France from the start of the 2024 school year, twenty years after its creation.
This decision follows the favorable opinion of an advisory commission chaired by the prefect, which examined at the end of November both the financing and the content of the Muslim ethics course.
The school management intends to take administrative action
The decision to terminate the contract was taken on Thursday, and a letter sent to the high school on Friday, the prefecture said on Sunday evening, without wanting to detail the content of the letter. School officials said they have not yet received it. They announced at the end of November that they would take legal action if the contract was terminated.
According to Parisian which reveals this decision, the prefect points out in his letter management irregularities and teachings described as contrary to the values of the Republic, in particular during Muslim ethics courses. Still according to the newspaper, an inspection by the CDI showed a lack of resources on certain themes such as homosexuality, and the preponderance of religious works on Islam to the detriment of other religions.
The Lille establishment of 400 students, opened in 2003 with the support of the former UOIF (now Muslims of France), in the wake of the ban on the veil in schools, became in 2008 the first Muslim high school in France to be signed under contract. Since then, he has regularly ranked among the best in the region.
Inspections yet favorable to high school
The high school has been in conflict since 2019 with the Hauts-de-France Region, which refuses each year to pay the subsidy provided for under the contract, accusing Averroès of a Qatari donation of 950,000 euros in 2014. National Education had by against carried out several inspections, without finding grounds to call into question the association contract. The General Inspectorate of National Education had notably estimated in a 2020 report that “nothing” suggests “that teaching practices (…) do not respect the values of the Republic”.
Averroès is one of only two Muslim high schools under contract in France, with the Al-Kindi high school near Lyon (174 students). The school group has more than 800 students, including 400 under contract. In France, 1,700 students were educated in schools, colleges and these two Muslim high schools under contract at the start of the 2022 school year, according to National Education.