This is everything that a media frenzy hides and distorts. While reactions have been mounting since the announcement of the early departure of the headmaster of the Ravel high school, threatened with death after an altercation with a student to make her remove her veil, the first union of school heads wanted to put the dots the i’s. While some point to the responsibility of the ministry, SNPDEN-Unsa affirms for its part that its members, including the threatened principal, feel supported by the authorities.
“Since Samuel Paty, we have had real support. We got out of the ‘no wave’. The State really supports colleagues. We do not perceive a particular flaw or failure,” declared Bruno Bobkiewicz, general secretary of the union.
“Political positions”
Since the affair was publicized, some commentators have indeed debated the responsibility of the ministry. The sister of Samuel Paty, a history professor murdered in 2020, pointed to “wait-and-see behavior” on the part of public authorities while noting a “visible improvement”. A major daily newspaper headlined “When the school goes backwards”, while the Reconquest candidate in the European elections, Marion Maréchal Le Pen, spoke of “defeat of the State”.
Accusations brushed aside by the union, which denounces “political postures” for the latter: “That’s not what we perceive, you just have to ask them the question. The colleagues we support feel supported by the institution; you have to know when the work is done correctly. » In September, a father threatened to “cut off the head” of his daughter’s principal, who wanted to wear the abaya in class. A head of a school in Ivry-sur-Seine also suffered such threats for having asked a student to remove her veil and her abaya.
Concerning the complaint of slanderous denunciation announced by Prime Minister Gabriel Attal against the student who had accused the principal of her Parisian high school of having assaulted her after her refusal to remove her veil, the general secretary of the heads of establishment is shown satisfied. “We must welcome this, we take it as something positive,” says Bruno Bobkiewicz.
Social networks singled out
“We have become civil parties for all situations, it is the profession which is attacked”, adds the SNPDEN-Unsa which, although it feels support from the State, still has demands. Particularly upstream, on the training of teachers on issues of secularism, which he considers insufficient. “The minister announced that one in two teachers was trained in these issues, but we know that this is not the case,” said Carole Zerbib, principal at the Vauquelin high school in Paris and member of the union executive.
The big black spot also concerns social networks, pointed out by school leaders. Regarding the removal of criminal tweets, “we must continue to gain in efficiency,” they believe. And we also need to “work with young people on what we do and what we don’t do,” they add.
“This goes beyond the question of school. There are people aged 40-50 who carry these threats. When we pursue a policy of dialogue in an establishment, that unfortunately does not prevent us from tweeting at the other end of France,” regrets Nicolas Bray, academic secretary of the union. “We are standing to say ‘we will not back down’, there is no question of backing down in the face of attacks,” launched Bruno Bobkiewicz, combative.
” He is surrounded “
The SNPDEN-Unsa affirms, regarding the threatened principal who is retiring, that he “did not resign”. “He was protected, in a concerted manner,” specifies the union. The organization also added that he had indeed left for “security” reasons, thus wishing to rectify an “error” according to him from the ministry, since the Paris rectorate had first affirmed to AFP that this official would have left for “personal convenience”.
“The work has been done but this sentence is out of sync. Everyone knows why the colleague left the establishment. It’s a mistake,” said Bruno Bobkiewicz. On Thursday, the principal’s lawyer had already made the first correction, saying that he had “obviously left for security reasons”. Nicolas Bray finally wanted to be reassuring about the state of health of the principal in question. “He is surrounded, but it’s something that shakes you up, it takes time. »