School: an idea of progress

To begin, what’s the progress? The progress is an idea according to which humanity would evolve towards an ideal, by advances. These advances could be scientific, social or technological. The progress is subjective; it can be considered positive by some, or negative for others (for example, the economic globalization, encouraged by the liberals and criticized by the alterglobalists). Through this comment, we will discuss the social progress of free schooling, in a first part the example of France, then the fighting around the world to finally achieve by a conclusion.

Thanks to the Jules Ferry laws, the school has been free since 1881 and will become, one year later, secular and compulsory. The free schooling is very important because this allows the famous promise of republican equality, the social rise, breaking with monarchical values, the filiation and the privileges. Although children don’t start equals (Bourdieu's concept of "cultural capital" according to which children from high classes are predestined for academic success), the school exists to ensure a similar education for all, free, which enables poor classes to evolve socially. The school erased the economic inequalities but also the religious differences, by adopting a secular system. The school must be impervious from religious pressures; it’s this law that encouraged the extension of the secular concept to the whole of our republic.

The question of school is a subject that has not ceased to be at the centre of the debate. The school could be a factor of racial exclusion. Note that it was not until May 17, 1954 that the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional the segregation in public schools of the United States of America. Religious extremism can be a bulwark to knowledge, as in Pakistan, when one Taliban shooted Malala Yousafzai, on the 9th of October of 2012, only because she wanted to learn. Although the school enrolment of children in the world is progressing, this evolution is unequal, 1.6 million out of school in North America and Western Europe against 32.5 million children in sub-Saharan Africa (Observatory of Inequalities,  statistics of 2015).

All these elements allow me to conclude that school is one of the most important forms of progress. It is a factor of social equality, both economic and religious. This is one of the most significant pillars of inequality, and one can be attacked to defend that right. Finally, the words of the youngest Nobel Peace Prize should speak for themselves: « Let us pick up our books and our pens. They are our most powerful weapons. One child, one teacher, one book and one pen can change the world. » (Malala).

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