The minister of Education, Jean-Michel Blanquer is the subject of criticism : it would not be fast enough to déconfiner students. He believes to have fulfilled its commitments. His goal : return to full-time pupils on 22 June. Decryption.
“You see, I’m not paranoid”… Jean-Michel Blanquer swipes next to the table which is drawn up under the great plane-tree of the department. It gauge the spacing of the plates. “There is no more than a metre between the guests and I do not have problem”, he says before asking the next person.
This morning, the minister of Education, is angry. In truth, it does not digest the criticism addressed to him for several days. To him, the worthy tenant of the office of Jules Ferry, would not be quite hasty, soon-to-déconfiner students… this is what believe some pediatricians, many parents of students relayed by his political opponents, and even the scientific Board, which advises the government. Jean-Michel Blanquer, however, has the habit of criticism, but those ones, they do not pass, but not at all. “I took my risk in the beginning of may, when I said that it wasn’t three months without school. But at the time, I was told that I sent the children to death. However, a month later, the critics, these are : why you’re not going faster ? I consider it as a great victory,” says the minister The Dispatchbut his eyes said otherwise. Anger behind his glasses.
One thing to him was a pleasure this week, this editorial, on France Cultureby Frederic Says, who recalls : “there are still a few weeks, what was the tone of the public debate ? How can we dare to re-open the schools ? What unconsciousness to imagine a return to school, even partial, before the summer ?” Jean-Michel Blanquer, he has not forgotten it. He remembers well, also, to those who cautioned : if there was the slightest problem in a school, he would end up in front of the justice. “It changes registry in relation to polemics as usual”, he smiles.
“I had said early may, it was the beginning of may”
The scientific Council has not, either, been a relief obvious. In fact, while the minister of Education very early on advocated for a re-opening early schools, in a document, finalized on April 16, but sent to the national authorities on 20 April, fourteen experts were taking a clear stance against the reopening of schools on may 11, considering “measures barriers that are especially difficult to implement at the more young people”. They proposed to “maintain the nurseries, schools, colleges, high schools and universities closed until the month of September.”
Change of register today, its president, Professor Delfraissy advocates for a reduction of sanitary rules. “We could, while retaining measures of social distancing, reducing the health protocol in after-school care by the end of June : during meals, recess, or sport”, was responsible for it Sunday 7 June.
Jean-Michel Blanquer, he has never lost sight of his goal : reopen as soon as possible to limit the increase in inequality between the students. At the end of march, it talks on 4 may as a possible date. “I had said early may, it was the beginning of may “, he recalls today. But to do this, he had to force his luck, leaving, sometimes, to take speed Matignon as this April 21, when he presents the plan of déconfinement before the commission of cultural affairs and education of the national Assembly. “I am obliged to start early the institution under tension. It takes two weeks to reopen an establishment that has been closed. I was in the right line of what had been said by the president,” he remembers.
At the same time, the virtual classes are already implemented through the NCA, who, after the hurricane Irma, had made a platform in the event of a school closure. The department adapts, the teachers also. The minister sees exacerbate the character traits that already existed in each : these profs are inhabited by a great professional conscience that turn into real heroes and those who fail to call. He sees a drawing of the map of the absentee that, little by little, follows the contours of one of the strikers of the TRAY 2019. He sees above all the students win in the most disadvantaged areas.
Return all full-time students at the school on June 22,
“My goal is to advance children in academic difficulty. The last assessments in REP and+ REP were good,” he whispered with regret, the eyes on the figures of those who have not found the way to and from school since the beginning of march. He has in mind the text of Kipling’s “You’ll be a man my son” which begins with these words : “If you can see destroyed the work of thy life, and without saying a single word to put you to rebuild it”… He hopes to rebuild. It recently launched the program “Vacation learning” which will affect 1 million students.
At the end of August, a week of free tutoring is expected. But more importantly, his goal is to return all students to school full-time from June 22, “because the risk of a containment long, it is the weakening of freedom it is also the weakening of the value of work,” says Jean-Michel Blanquer.
In the meantime, the minister, who welcomes the fact that France has not followed the path of Italy that will not open schools before September, distributes, like every year, a collection of la Fontaine’s fables to the class of CM2.
His favorite ? “The council held by the rats”, which sets the scene of the rats, beautiful speakers, but who fail to walk the talk. An allegory of the months of confinement ? He will say no more. A few weeks of a reshuffle, the minister of Education just wants to know that he, for his part, kept his word.
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