Vice Recteur Nicole Noilhetas (left) with Chargée de Mission Evelyne Fleming. (Robert Luckock photo)
MARIGOT--Vice Recteur Nicole Noilhetas held her first press conference on Friday since taking up her post as Head of Education for St. Martin and St. Barthélemy on July 1.
She began by giving a resume of her career, first as a teacher then climbing the ladder to become an inspector in economics and management. In vocational high school with knowledge of various sectors, she became the academic delegate for technical education to the Recteur of Corsica for four years.
A posting to Auvergne, in Puy-de-Dôme, followed as an Assistant Principal, taking charge of primary and secondary education. Lastly, before coming to St. Martin, she took up a senior posting as Deputy Director of Education in New Caledonia that she held for three years.
“I am extremely happy to be in St. Martin St. Barthélemy,” she said. “Before coming here and before applying for this position, I took the measure of the territory. I am not coming here by chance. I took stock of the two territories. I tried to understand the challenges and what I could bring.
“We are dealing with two different communities that have different realities, and I have understood that well. This requires specific responses for each of the two territories. However, there are still challenges that I consider common. I will talk about staff stability and the attractiveness of positions. I know that with both communities, work has already begun on housing, for example.”
Staff appointments:
“I believe that welcoming staff is essential. It needs to be refined because this welcome will normally allow them to have a very good understanding of the territories and help them adapt and integrate more quickly. Then, it will be about being on the ground, in schools and institutions, to provide support.”
Teacher training:
“I need to see how teachers are trained and what the training needs are. So personal stability, the attractiveness of positions, and academic success in both territories are important. How will this work? We align the national guidelines, the academic guidelines of Guadeloupe, and the cultural and linguistic realities of this territory, or rather these two territories. That’s what it is, there will need to be an adaptation.
“So that we can take these realities into account. This is what will allow students to succeed in this consideration. Educational technology helps connect families and schools. It also perhaps allows for better continuation of one’s education, especially with university. How do you access higher education when there is no university here? Even though I know that St. Martin aims to develop something.”
Reducing inequalities:
“It seems to me that reducing inequalities will raise several issues, including questioning teaching practices to better master fundamental knowledge, which you will see is a priority. It will also involve the quality of learning, meaning better-trained teachers, and it will address multilingualism. These are topics I will return to later.”
Educational Alliances:
“I believe that to meet the challenges, whether in St. Martin or St. Barthélemy, first, I cannot do it alone. The national education system cannot do it alone. I believe in educational alliances. I truly believe that to implement an educational policy effectively, there must be an educational alliance. That means working here with the two communities, with State Services, and with the various stakeholders.”
Parents:
“Parents are important. We have to involve parents because we are in co-education, and it is necessary for this co-education to work. It’s not always easy, but I believe parents have their place in this work. So I work closely, I think, with all the partners. I am someone quite open to discussion and exchange.
“We talk and see what we can build within a framework of the national education system. But within this framework, the idea is to work all together in the same way. I collaborate closely with the Recteur of Guadeloupe and his teams, as well as the services and inspection bodies. I have been in contact with the Recteur for some time. I believe we get along well. I think we will do good work together. The services will listen to me, I believe.”
My Goals:
“My goals are to ensure an inclusive, ambitious, and equitable school where every student can find their place, succeed, and have teams mobilised around a project that is coherent, well-structured, and that connects national and academic guidelines with the realities of the two territories, meaning linguistic and cultural aspects. I am someone who is quite organised, I would say, and I like weekly actions. I know that many actions are taking place.”
Priorities for up-coming school year:
“At the national level, there are several priorities, including strengthening the mastery of fundamental skills in mathematics and French. This remains an important national priority. So the focus will be on developing language, comprehension, reading, writing, and emphasising spelling and grammar. Certain requirements will be set.
“It is about being able to develop a complex thought for each child. To develop scientific reasoning. This applies throughout the entire journey, of course. And to make every young person autonomous, both intellectually and mentally, is essential, especially with artificial intelligence. We need young people who know how to think, how to take a stance, and how to express their opinions. And opinions that are fair and accurate.”
Results of evaluations, exams:
“I will request a detailed analysis of the results from the evaluations and exams so that the teams can take ownership of these results in detail and better support the students according to their needs. That is a hope I have. I think it already exists and is being done, but it will need to be verified and move towards this detailed analysis to make use of the students’ results and perhaps better support teacher training needs as well. And maybe develop teaching practices that are adapted to the students’ needs.”
Multilingualism:
“Multilingualism is a strength, it is an asset for young people and we must use it. And we must allow all young people to have a path that enables them to be multilingual, that is to say either bilingual or trilingual. And this will be a guiding thread throughout their schooling.
“For success and better integration, because normally when you speak two or three languages, I think it is easy to fit in, in the Caribbean region, and even in the international arena. I would like to, starting from the new school year, take a little time to conduct a thorough assessment.
“Regarding all the measures that promote multilingualism in the region, I want a comprehensive assessment that will help me understand the difficulties, what is working well, whether the teachers are well trained, and the success of the students in these programmes. So, I will try to look into that because it will help better support the existing measures.”
Bilingual classes:
“There are in total eight bilingual classes across four schools: senior kindergarten, middle kindergarten, and senior kindergarten in pre-school. They are open, or rather, they will be maintained. They are open now, and four first-grade classes across four schools will be maintained, making a total of 12 classes that I heard were going to close, but they will not close; they will be maintained. It is not an issue.
“Only 12% of children in bilingual classes at the primary and secondary levels are enrolled. So, indeed, we can develop bilingual classes, but we also need to consider other options for children who are not in these bilingual classes. For example, the Émile programme allows all other children to benefit from learning a foreign language.”
Noilhetas declined to discuss the reasons why the Education Inspector wanted to close bilingual classes in the nursery schools.
Social media ban:
Children under 15 are banned from accessing social media as of September 1 in all French schools. Asked how this would be implemented, Noilhetas said each class will discuss with the teacher and parents how it will be done, taking into account a mobile phone may be needed in case of an emergency, or for other reasons.
