Pisa ranking: what to remember from the measures announced by Gabriel Attal to raise the level of students

While on Tuesday 5 December the OECD Pisa survey reported a “historic” decline in the level of French students in mathematics and French – especially in reading comprehension – the Minister of Education Gabriele Attal a few hours later, he announced a series of measures to “ put the requirement back » at school, all levels together.

Modified exams

Starting with new rules for national exams. From 2025, for the patent, greater importance will be given to the final vote in the end-of-year tests, which will represent 60% of the final verdict, compared to 50% today.

Furthermore, the the patent will now be essential for the transition to high school. Students who do not obtain this will not enter second grade. Instead, they will have to attend a “prep-high school” course.

As for the final exams, they will also undergo a small change. Modeled on the long-awaited French baccalaureate test that high school students take at the end of their first year, an exercise similar in mathematics and scientific culture will be implemented starting from 2025-2026.

Level groups in middle school

Gabriel Attal wants to establish “level groups” also in middle school, in French and mathematics. Therefore, from the beginning of the 2024 school year, students in the 6th and 5th grades will be divided into three groups of levels for these subjects groups that will be established starting from the beginning of the 2025 school year for the 4th and 3rd classes. Students will be able to move from one group to another depending on their level of progress, with a maximum of fifteen students for those with greater difficulty.

Furthermore, middle school students who experience greater difficulties in French and mathematics will be entitled to “adequate schooling”: they will have more hours in these subjects and less in others.

Repeat a year decided by the teachers

Another important provision announced by the minister: now the last word on a student’s failure will be up to the teachers, no longer to the parents. Teachers will also be able to “recommend, or even prescribe” successful courses to students during the school holidays, the results of which will determine their progression to the next class.

New programs will also be activated in nursery and primary schools from September 2024. According to Attal they will be “less voluminous” and will provide “clarifications” on the objectives, also learning some notions, such as fractions and decimals, numbers, which will be learned previously, from CE1.

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