A school canteen in Metz.
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City of Metz
No more indoor sport, no stirring in the canteen ... After the announcement of new measures to curb the coronavirus epidemic, Thursday evening, school directors must adapt, a headache in terms of 'organization.
On Thursday, during its press conference, the government announced a new round of health screws to try to slow down the epidemic of Covid-19 and its new English variant.
Extend the time slots for canteen staff
The school is concerned in more than one way: school and extracurricular physical activities indoors will be suspended "until further notice", there will no longer be any mixing possible in the canteen, "weak link" in the school. organization since the students find themselves there without a mask, and the screening capacity in the establishments will be increased with an objective of 300,000 tests per week.
As it has become a ritual after each announcement modifying the school protocol, the school directors waited for official instructions on Friday morning.
While anticipating "undoubtedly a week of hesitation", many were already wondering how to adapt to the new constraints.
“The students are much closer to each other in the canteen than the rest of the time at school,” admits the director of a nursery school in Paris.
"But unless the municipality extends the time slots for canteens and animators so as to spread out the services, it seems difficult to change things".
The art of the circus to replace indoor sport?
An observation shared by Joël Smith, director of a school in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine): “currently, children are fed in pairs by mixing two classes.
If we only want one class in the refectory, we will have to double the service time, which seems impossible ”.
The constraint seems particularly strong for large schools, often concentrated in towns.
But in rural areas, other imperatives complicate matters.
"We are limited by school transport", explains Anabel Roy, of the SE-Unsa union, at the head of a small school in Haute-Vienne.
"If we do not want to cut back on school hours, the lunch break cannot exceed 1:15, so even with only three classes, it is impossible not to mix the students".
Even more than the canteen, it was the suspension of indoor sports lessons that seemed to concern school principals.
"It's going to be a real headache", anticipates Dominique David, at the head of a school in the 20th arrondissement of Paris.
"If it rains or snows, we will not be able to go outside and therefore no longer do any sport at all", he regrets.
Instead, he plans to strengthen the circus arts activity, which allows students to distance themselves and the wearing of masks.
The swimming pool is over
In kindergarten, solutions will have to be found to replace motor skills courses (gymnastics, balance, etc.).
"We're going to stop and switch to cycling, to shopping in the courtyard," imagines the director of the Parisian school.
“We had a lot of indoor sports lessons, like fencing or wrestling, in a neighborhood dojo.
What are we going to replace them with?
“Asks Laaldja Mahamdi, director of a school in the 19th district of Paris.
"We also assume that the swimming pool lessons are over," she regrets.
“We are being thrown out of announcements but there is nothing operational,” criticizes Olivier Flippo, from SE-Unsa and at the head of a school in Cergy (Val-d'Oise).
In his view in particular, the decision to accelerate the testing policy in schools.
"I'm willing to bet that it will not be done in elementary school: it would take a lot of staff to perform them and even if we have them, these are complicated tests to perform on young children," he explains.
Before regretting that it is, once again, "for municipalities and schools to manage these decisions, at the last minute".
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