Personnaliser les parcours scolaires des élèves, un facteur d’émancipation ? Lectures et pratiques enseignantes divergentes

Abstract

Since the 1960s and the first steps towards the unification of the school system, reflections on educational adaptation have fuelled several reforms meant to deal with the heterogeneity of the student population. Presented as a “revolution of personalization” by the Education Secretary Luc Chatel, the 2010 reform of high school is part of this process, particularly through the implementation of the Personalized Support programme. An ethnographic inquiry into the reception of this requirement to personalize teaching reveals a divide among teachers. For some of them, personalization is a source of fulfilment and individual emancipation from the constraints of the school system. For others, personalizing school careers generates inequalities which compromise emancipation from the reproduction of social roles. Finally, the mix of representations and practices in the face of this reform suggests that teachers are guided by a multiplicity of logics that are ultimately likely to create cracks in the teaching profession.

Keywords

• individualisation
• emancipation
• school careers
• teachers
• high school reform