Emmanuel Macron will launch in June a new citizen convention on “the times of the child” where vacation times and school hours will be discussed, subjects that concern the daily life of millions of French people but also their share of irritants.
After the Citizen Convention on the Climate and that on the end of life, the head of state will ask a panel of citizens of floor on a third convention, said the Elysée confirming information from the Parisian.
“It seems to me necessary that we are working to ensure that the organization of our students’ days is more favorable to their development and learning, that a balance is also found to facilitate the lives of families,” the president told the newspaper.
The question of the number of weeks of vacation will also be addressed.
“France has a longer vacation than in many countries,” said the head of state in February.
“There are a lot of countries that only go on vacation from July 14. We have a vacation that is very very long in summer. Children who are not accompanied by their families will often lose from the school level (…) The time of children is something that we will open, but it must be a little discussed,” he said.
In France, a school year is made up of at least 36 weeks of class, and 16 weeks of vacation.
“The Citizen Convention seemed to me to be the most suitable French consultation tool, because it is a very complex question that will require many consensus between all those who are affected by this vast subject, such as parents, the educational community including extracurricular, local authorities and even tourism professionals,” added the Head of the State.
For Emmanuel Macron, the field of education also makes it possible to consider reforms without going through the Parliament box where his camp does not have the majority, most of the provisions on the School under the regulatory field.
During his wishes for the year 2025, Emmanuel Macron had suggested the launch of a new citizen agreement, or the organization of a referendum, saying that the French would be led to “decide” on determining subjects.
– “off topic” –
As with the end of life, Mr. Macron decided to entrust the organization of this citizen convention to the Economic, Social and Environmental Council (EESC).
“The democratic discomfort felt by our fellow citizens is also a crisis of the effectiveness of public action. And this is where participatory and social democracy takes on its full meaning by providing the material necessary for better constructed, more applicable, better accepted public policies,” said its president Thierry Beaudet.
By choosing the expression of “child’s time”, Emmanuel Macron avoids taking up that of “school rhythms”, a conflictual reform with the establishment of the four and a half day week at the school implemented at the beginning of François Hollande’s five-year term and on which ex-minister Vincent Peillon had ended up breaking his teeth.
As of now, the presidential initiative has attracted the wrath of the main teaching union of colleges and high schools.
“It is an off-topic on the part of the President of the Republic on education issues,” Sophie Venetitay told AFP Secretary General of SNES-FSU. “He is a diversion so as not to take care of emergencies and hide the state of the school that collapses: there is a lack of teachers, we have the most loaded classes in Europe …”
“We consider today that the education system has reached a break point, and that we absolutely must rethink the school in its expectations, in its objectives, and it must be a social debate”, welcomes Grégoire together, vice-president of the parents of students of the FCPE.
“We must rethink the question of school rhythms (…) but we ask that there is a much more global approach to the child. There are many other subjects to be tackled: the question of social and school mix, that of disability, that of the workforce in the classes”, highlights Mr. together.
