This September 1 marked the start of the school year but also the entry into force of a section of the law on separatism which targets families practicing homeschooling.
A large regional rally took place in Trémelin, in Brittany, to denounce this law which limits the use of family education.
Parents must now obtain permission to teach their children at home.
With the start of the school year, the tall pines bordering Lake Trémelin probably thought they had peace this Thursday.
Lost.
While twelve million children were called to class, the body of water located west of Rennes (Ille-et-Vilaine) was taken over by dozens of kids ranging from infants to adolescents.
Extended vacation?
Absolutely not.
If these children play around and even in the pond, it is with the blessing of their parents.
Here, we defend the IEF, that is to say the instruction in the family, more commonly called "school at home".
Organized each year by the IEF 35 collective, the gathering ironically celebrates the "non-return to school" by offering children a day far removed from that experienced in schools, colleges and high schools in France.
Here, no school bag or new pencil case, but a firm desire to defend this alternative model, which remains marginal but is attracting more and more parents.
However, the IEF took a serious blow in the head on September 1 with the entry into force of the law on family education.
For this start of the school year, all parents wishing to practice school at home had to obtain authorization.
Previously, only a declaration was required.
“The problem with this authorization is that many parents don't get it, without really understanding why.
There are real disparities between the academies,”
No longer the right to homeschool.
On the other hand, entrusting my kid to "not even an animator" because, to be an animator, you need a bafa.
The bafa is 8 days of theoretical training and internships.
It's not as if the education of our children is not the future!
— Solune 🦋 (@solunette) August 30, 2022
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Mother of two boys aged 12 and 14, she has always practiced homeschooling.
His two teenagers never attended school.
“I discovered this for a year when I was a child.
It was my grandmother, who was a seamstress, who taught us.
I have always kept this idea in mind for my children.
I wanted to make them discover something else”.
Like all families whose children are already out of school, Katy is quiet for two years and will not need authorization, provided that the checks carried out by the inspection are favorable to her.
The situation is much more complex for parents whose children are just entering school.
Since 2019, school is compulsory from the age of 3 in France.
Parents wishing to leave the school system must now justify this choice.
A disability, an intensive sports or artistic practice or the homelessness of the family are among the criteria used by the institution.
The last is much more vague and evokes “the existence of a situation specific to the child motivating the educational project”.
Each file is studied, but few are accepted.
Sometimes rightly so, as certain situations can lead to the isolation of children in poorly adapted contexts.
But sometimes wrongly, when families simply want to manage a more autonomous instruction themselves, inspired by models like Montessori.
“I received the rejection letter yesterday (Wednesday).
Normally, I should have put my son in school this morning.
But I didn't have the courage.
I want to take time for reflection.
Numerous appeals before the administrative courts have already been formulated.
In the Toulouse academy, 283 of the 314 requests for reason 4 were refused.
“This reason 4 is the exception, you really need a valid reason”, insisted the rector Mostafa Fourar.
Jennifer is one of them.
Two years ago, this mother of three children decided to withdraw her eldest from primary school to teach him at home.
“My son had good results but he couldn't stay still.
Sitting in class all day was not for him.
All his teachers told me so”.
With the new law, she will be able to continue to teach her 11-year-old grand, but not her 4-year-old junior.
The reason ?
She does not have the baccalaureate.
" It's absurd.
Especially when you know how teachers are recruited at the moment, ”tackles Coralie, whose son has been benefiting from family education for a year.
Already under consideration for a few years and the insistent remarks of distraught teachers, Jennifer's choice to leave school was confirmed during the first confinement of March 2020. A date on which millions of parents were able to test - in many more or less good conditions – what homeschooling was like.
Already on the rise, the number of interested families has jumped.
About 70,000 children would be involved in home education.
What do they think of it?
“I really like the IEF because we do a bit of everything.
We work in the morning, and in the afternoon I can see my girlfriends and friends,” explains Amande, 10 years old.
The girl was interested in joining a “normal” class this year.
“I wanted to try, to meet other children, to see what it was like.
“We suffer from these prejudices when it is unfounded”
Faced with the threat of having to obtain the famous authorization if her daughter wanted to come home, Amande's mother did not want to take the risk anyway.
“People sometimes think that our children are not socialized or that they are not going to learn enough.
We suffer from these prejudices when it is unfounded.
They are very comfortable, they develop skills, autonomy, ”says Claire, who hopes for the repeal of the law.
If her choice is ideological, Claire has a moved thought for all the children who do not like school.
“There are families for whom school becomes a real problem.
By forbidding them homeschooling, we are taking away a solution from them”.
To promote its law, the government insisted on its necessity to fight against radicalization and separatism.
An argument that did not convince many people.
“Anyway, you had to declare yourself in the past.
And you really think those families did?
asks Katy.
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