This announcement balances one of the most controversial measures of the Blanquer reform, which had removed mathematics from the common core of the compulsory subjects taught in first and final year.
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It was a desire shared by many players in the sector. The Ministry of Education announced on Sunday November 13 the reintroduction of compulsory mathematics education in the common core, for all high school students in the general stream from the first, at the start of the 2023 school year. “The minister returns to the Banquer high school in a somewhat forced way”reacted on Sunday the secretary general of the SNES-FSU, Sophie Vénétitay. “But there are still questions: will there be enough teachers? What articulation between first and final? And nothing is said about the programs”she lamented.
An hour and a half of mathematics will be made compulsory for all first general students who have not chosen the mathematics specialty, said the Ministry of National Education in a press release. This announcement is part of a strategy that sets out a battery of measures to “reconcile all students” with math and “promoting equality between girls and boys”.
Among these measures is the establishment of groups with reduced numbers in mathematics in 6th grade or objectives such as that of parity between girls and boys by 2027 in the mathematics, physics-chemistry or expert mathematics specialities, deemed the most selective.
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Educational community, researchers, big bosses and politicians were concerned about the decline in the scientific pool as well as the strengthening of social and gender inequalities caused, since the reform implemented in 2019, by the disappearance of mathematics in the common core of subjects compulsory courses taught in first and final classes of the general stream.
On June 2, Emmanuel Macron confirmed the “non-compulsory” return of this subject in the common core of first, in September, three years after its abolition by the Minister of National Education at the time, Jean-Michel Blanquer, as part of the reform of the high school. But the option was considered insufficient for a large part of the educational actors.