PRESS RELEASE

ENTITIES AND PUBLIC POLICIES

4 october 2017

A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO TEACHER

MANAGEMENT

A reform still to implement

Our school system requires an extensive overhaul if all students are to succeed. In its

May 2013 report, the Cour des comptes showed that changing how we manage

teachers, who are key to a functioning education system, is a major known catalyst for

improved performance. However, the central government has not used the substantial

and growing fiscal effort directed in recent years at the national education system to

make structural reforms. The personnel measures taken in 2012 and the remuneration

measures taken in 2016 were not coupled with concessions on the conditions under

which teachers practice their profession, on work organisation or on working hours.

Reforming the practice of the teaching profession

Improving the performance of the education system requires a change in the practice of the

teaching profession. However, the adjustments made in recent years have not been sufficient

to reduce inflexibility and meet the educational requirements that the schools have set for

themselves. As international comparisons show, the quality of teacher training, the organisation

of teachers’ work in the schools, the adequacy of teacher evaluations, teachers’ ability to ensure

continuity between primary school and secondary school, and their collective practices under

the direction of principals and head teachers all play a major role.

While the reinstatement of initial teacher training is a welcome development, additional efforts

are needed to raise professional standards. Redefining the regulatory service obligations in

secondary schools has had few tangible effects as their weekly framework has been maintained,

without annualisation, and the definition of their missions remains incomplete (substitution, for

example). Teacher evaluations do not consider student outcomes. The rigid segmentation

between primary school teachers and secondary school teachers limits the actual scope of the

“common core” concept. The uncertain positioning of principals

and head teachers vis-à-vis

teachers limits their ability to adapt the educational structure to students’ needs, even though

they are best placed to do so.

Better meeting students’

needs through teacher assignments

To improve the performance and fairness of the school system, local environments and student

profiles need to be more fully taken into account. However, teaching assignments are based on

a scale that is applied automatically, does not account for the qualitative needs of the national

education system, and barely considers each teacher’s specific skills. There is therefore no

guarantee that their profile will be matched to their position, profile-based positions are

underutilised, and head teachers are not sufficiently involved in their implementation. The

assignment of large numbers of new teachers and of contract substitutes to the most challenging

positions remains a major obstacle. The limited appeal of certain positions is considered, but

not to the extent needed to be effective: new measures with no connection to traditional

management frameworks need to be implemented.

The ongoing challenge of covering short-term replacements points to a management framework

that is too inflexible to adapt to the daily reality of the needs of the education system, due to the

absence of local management, head teachers’ lack of autonomy and the impossibility of

adjusting teacher service.

Building a comprehensive strategy for employment, remuneration and

working hours

The creation of 60,000 positions encountered greater recruitment difficulties in certain school

districts and for certain disciplines. In particular, no concessions in terms of increasing the

flexibility of the teacher management framework have been sought. Generally speaking, there

is no comprehensive strategy guiding the management of personnel, remuneration and teacher

service. These different levers are subject to disparate measures. The situation is therefore

doubly disadvantageous: first, the cost of the education system is increasing but performance

has not improved and, second, there is no support for the necessary reforms due to the limited

fiscal leeway.

Three actions are therefore required: adopt a comprehensive, multiyear approach that breaks

with the purely quantitative policy; create a stronger differentiation in resource allocation to focus

efforts on the main challenges facing the school system; and take a concession-based approach

to implement the necessary structural reforms. These actions are particularly important as the

national education payroll will continue to increase significantly due to decisions that have

already been made. It is therefore both urgent and possible to negotiate concessions.

Recommendations

The Cour des comptes has made 13 recommendations that affect the teaching profession,

teaching assignments and teachers’ working conditions. They aim in particular to:



incorporate

substitution and continuing education into teachers’ service obligations;



annualise teachers’ service obligations;



develop versatility, notably by including it in the initial training;



give principals and head teachers more responsibility;



have head

teachers account more fully for students’ needs when

making teacher

assignments;



make certain positions more attractive through compensation- and career-based measures;



tie the compensation- and career-based measures to savings by managing personnel more

efficiently and streamlining the training programme.

Read the report

PRESS CONTACT:

Ted Marx



Head of communication



T

+33 (0)1 42 98 55 62



tmarx@ccomptes.fr

Denis Gettliffe



Head of Press Relations



T

+33 (0)1 42 98 55 77



dgettliffe@ccomptes.fr

@Courdescomptes

ccomptes