Political return: in the midst of the fog, Élisabeth Borne maintains the course... while carefully avoiding talking about the budget

It was windy this Wednesday, August 27, in the garden of the Ministry of National Education . Wind in the branches of the plane tree beloved by the former Jean-Michel Blanquer, and wind in the words of Minister Élisabeth Borne, who was holding her back-to-school press conference there – the first, and probably the last, given the political context.

She simply brushed aside the awkward questions: "This is not the time to talk about the 2026 budget ," was the reply the unfortunate journalist who dared to insist on the subject heard. As if the effectiveness of the measures the minister was preparing to unfold had no connection with the resources the nation intends to devote to them...

Élisabeth Borne preferred to repeat that "since 2017, the National Education budget has increased by 16 billion euros" , omitting to specify that this increase is, almost entirely, due to the mechanical increase in remuneration resulting from seniority.

Also overlooked are the positions eliminated this fall, under the pretext of the declining population in primary schools. And then, by bringing recruitment exams down to the bac + 3 level, the reform of initial teacher training will be enough to resolve the serious crisis of attractiveness of the profession. Close the ban.

And after recalling that "nothing is possible without a school that protects" and which is both "a place of knowledge and well-being" , she had to admit rather pitifully that the recruitment of medical and social staff (nurses, doctors, social workers, psychologists), promised in March during the School Health Conference , was anything but a given.

It is well established that the educational policy implemented since 2017 consists of doing everything possible to weaken public schools as much as possible, in order to offer an ever-increasing role to the commercial sector – and this at the cost of a terrible explosion of socio-educational inequalities. Élisabeth Borne is certainly not getting out of this rut. But we must grant her the ability to adjust at the margins what is most visible.

Is the fiasco of the "diversified pathway" (between internships or preparation for further studies) in vocational high schools becoming too obvious? The final exams for the vocational baccalaureate, brought forward to May, will be pushed back by two weeks, and the "diversification" section will be reduced to four weeks instead of six.

Similarly, among the frenetic waltz of six ministers who have succeeded one another on rue de Grenelle since May 2022, she will be the first to acknowledge, in half-hearted terms, the ravages of continuous assessment in the baccalaureate : it must be "rethought to reduce the pressure and anxiety" that it causes among students.

The headmaster of each high school is responsible for establishing, in consultation with representatives of teachers, parents and students, an "evaluation project" intended to rebalance the effects. In the same chapter, we note that the compulsory secondary school certificate for entry into the second year, the extension of "needs groups" to the ^4th and 3rd ^year classes or the generalization of "Prep second year" classes, all these pillars of Gabriel Attal's "clash of knowledge" , all this is being shelved or put on standby.

The fact remains that only partially acknowledging the failures of his predecessors' assaults is not enough to outline the contours of the ambitious education policy that young French people so desperately need to build their future and, at the same time, that of the nation. To achieve this, in addition to truly listening to professionals, families, and students, we must be able to provide the necessary resources to achieve this ambition. We always end up coming back to the budget...