boarding school “is not the solution”, affirms the representative of the National Union of Management Personnel of National Education

To be able to accommodate students who have dropped out of school and who have problems with violence, “human resources” are needed, recalls Dominique Gobetti, Monday on franceinfo.

The boarding school “is not the solution” to deal with young perpetrators of violence, affirms, on franceinfo Monday April 22, Dominique Gobetti, herself principal of a high school with a boarding school in Épinay-sur-Seine, in Seine-Saint-Denis, and representative of the National Union management personnel of National Education (SNPDEN). Gabriel Attal is due to visit a boarding school in Nice (Alpes-Maritimes) on Monday.

The Prime Minister proposed, Thursday, sending adolescents close to delinquency to boarding schools for “cut quickly” of their “bad Company”. “It seems very complicated to us to give a student a civic culture that he does not have and to teach him to obey when he is not used to doing so in his family life,” reacts Dominique Gobetti.

The boarding school “is not a prison”

“I find it hard to imagine that a young person who is violent on the outside, who cannot obey his parents, can all of a sudden, by a miracle, because he is in a boarding school, because that he is faced with an adult, a supervisor, can suddenly transform himself”, explains the principal. In her establishment in Épinay-sur-Seine, she welcomes “young people who may be weak or have academic difficulties”but who “have no problem with authority, with adults.” The boarding school “is not a prison”even if there is “an internal regulation which can be strict for some”recalls Dominique Gobetti.

To be able to accommodate students who have dropped out of school and have problems with violence, it would be necessary to “human resources”, “adults trained to manage these students who have a right to emancipate themselves and open up to life”. Gabriel Attal opened the door, Thursday, to welcoming violent adolescents in boarding schools for a year or only during school holidays. Gold, “during school holidays, we are on vacation, so it does not fall within our competence”, underlines Dominique Gobetti. “We don’t have teachers, we don’t have educational assistants during school holidays”she adds.