Sheep to replace students? This school did it (and there’s a sad reason)

“Our children are not sheep, stop counting them! » This is what Loïc Firtion, president of the parents’ association of the Nitting-Voyer-Hermelange school group, in Moselle, says, as reported by HuffPost. In fact, National Education asks the three municipalities a minimum of 98 students register to prevent the school’s fifth class from closing at the start of the next school year. The solution found? Four sheep enter, very seriously.

Sheep to replace missing students

There are currently 94 students enrolled in this rural school and four sheep. Very officially, with the support of the Municipality, the sheep, kindly lent by a farmer, all have their parents, a date of birth, an address and a name: John Deere, Valériane Deschamps, Phil Tondus and Marguerite Duprès. A small enclosure had even been set up in the courtyard for them, with a sign that said: ” welcome to our four new members “.

While this situation may make you smile, it is nevertheless very sad, as one of the parents explains in the columns of RTL :

The classes have a sufficient number. If we close this lesson, we will not be able to break down the walls. So what do we do? Do we put bunk beds? It’s unthinkable.

A classy closure, symbol of the oblivion of the countryside

Voyer Mayor Bernard Janson is desperate about the situation as his town tries to attract new residents:

We have made large investments. And in the three villages there are residential complexes under construction, but this does not influence the decisions of the academic services.

An absurd and unjust situation that municipalities and parents rightly don’t want to let go of.

In a video published by the RPI Nitting-Voyer-Hermelange parents’ association, they sing:

We know very well what is happening, we are the forgotten, the peasants, the lost, those too far from Paris, the least of their worries. (…) When in the highest spheres, in the corridors of the Ministry, the students are figures, there are people on the floor, with their hands full of chalk who take themselves for subordinates.

While waiting for things to change, the sheep have returned to their fold and the message is conveyed.