France pays kids to attend school

Rewards Students With € 10,000 For Good Grades

Katrin Bennhold

Paris: In poor Paris suburbs it now pays off to do well in school—literally. High school students can earn rewards worth up to € 10,000 for their class to share if they attend lessons and get good grades.

The pilot program, which took effect on Monday in three vocational schools in working-class neighbourhoods near the French capital, is the most eye-catching of a number of government measures aimed at tackling a chronic problem of poor class attendance, mass dropouts and high youth unemployment in France.

The idea relies on a combination of peer pressure and material incentives: Students jointly commit to an average attendance and performance target. Depending on how ambitious the target is, the government will pay from € 2,000, about $3,000, to € 10,000 into a group fund that can be spent on anything from driving lessons to class trips when the target is achieved.

“We’re trying to be creative—you have to be,” said Jean-Michel Blanquer,head of the greater Paris school district, who likened the initiative to a “moral contract.” But in the country of Victor Hugo and Voltaire, the idea of using money to motivate teenagers to learn has fuelled a debate that spans the political spectrum.

An independent organization, SOS Education, accused the government of “buying” students and undermining the values of the French Republic.

France’s costly and heavily unionized school system an iconic institution at the heart of the republic. It is where children are turned into French citizens since the days of the revolution.

But as high school dropout rates have swelled, particularly in ethnically diverse and poor neighbourhoods, calls for reform have grown louder. As many as 150,000 young people—about 13% of those aged 20 to 24—enter the labour market without a high school diploma. Four years ago a spell of rioting among youths of immigrant origin highlighted the frustrations suffered by many young people in the suburbs ringing major French cities.

Blanquer, at the Paris school district, said the opposition to the program missed the point. “If we had called it a scholarship everyone would have been on board.” he said. “Everyone agrees that we need to get young people off the streets and into class rooms and lower crime rates.” NYT NEWS SERVICE