Covid-19, tribute to Samuel Paty: back to school arouses criticism from teachers

A classroom in a school in Bischheim in the suburbs of Strasbourg on September 1, 2020. AP Photo / Jean-Francois Badias

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All students from schools, colleges and high schools in France are resuming lessons this Monday, November 2, as part of a reinforced health protocol, and will observe a minute of silence at 11 a.m. in tribute to the teacher Samuel Paty murdered in Conflans-Sainte -Honorine.

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Several new health measures will be applied in French establishments at the end of the All Saints holiday to fight against the spread of the coronavirus, while France entered a new phase of general confinement on Friday.

Wearing a compulsory mask will be extended to elementary school students from the age of six, as Prime Minister Jean Castex announced Thursday.

The ventilation of the premises will be reinforced and systematic, with complete ventilation at least every two hours, also specified the Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer in a letter to the staff of National Education.

Rules to limit student mixing will also be tightened, he added.

Minute of silence for Samuel Paty

A minute of silence will also be observed at 11 a.m. after reading


Jean Jaurès' letter to teachers, during a tribute to Samuel Paty, professor of history and geography

assassinated near his college in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine

on October 16 after showing caricatures of Muhammad during a course on free speech.

This tribute could be preceded by a “pedagogical time” around the values ​​of the Republic and its school.

This time can be held throughout the month of November in order to leave teachers who wish the time


necessary to prepare this sequence, added the Minister of National Education.

Angry teachers

But these measures arouse the ire of many teachers.

Because of the health situation, it is ultimately a brief tribute that will be paid to Samuel Paty, contrary to what was initially planned.

“ 

We have the feeling that we will not be able to pay our colleague the full tribute that is due to him.

In particular, it was planned between 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. that the teams could discuss and share their emotional reactions and then see if some felt able to take the students afterwards to try to dialogue with them on questions of secularism and knowledge. the questions of value of the Republic ... But there, all this will not be able to be done, one is satisfied with a minute of silence

 , deplores Frédérique Rolet, general secretary of the SNES-FSU union.

The new health protocol also arouses a lot of criticism from the teaching staff.

We are asking the Minister to put in place the educational continuity plan which makes it possible to lighten the groups by dividing them by two to allow the physical distancing of the students and a non mixing of the groups of students when there is the more traffic, that is to say the return of students in the morning at school, recess, lunchtime catering time or when we have half as many students, it's much easier to organize things,

 ”said the spokesperson of the teachers' union of Snuipp schools, Guislaine David.

An opinion shared by

the group of teachers Les Stylos Rouges

who consider the health measures taken by the government much too lax and who calls on Twitter for the resignation of the Minister of Education Jean-Michel Blanquer.

➡️ Lax sanitary protocol 🚑


➡️ Toxic masks


😷

➡️

Sloppy tribute 🏴 ➡️


Despised staff 😢


➡️ Frozen salaries 💸



👉 For all this and the rest, and before it is too late: # BlanquerDémission pic.twitter.com/fX5zEdsJpQ

  The Red Pens (@stylos_les) November 1, 2020

(With agencies)

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