In the Mirail district of Toulouse: Vauquelin, the digital college
By experimenting with a digital option in this new school year, the Vauquelin college, in Toulouse, aims to strengthen its attractiveness and its social diversity.
Compulsory option of one hour in 6th and optional in 5th, 4th and 3rd, digital learning made its return in majesty this Thursday, September 1st at the Vauquelin college, in the Mirail district, in Toulouse. The rector, Mostapha Fourar, and the president of the county council, Georges Méric, were able to see how diligently, under the guidance of two mathematics teachers, a class of young college students took their first steps in computer coding.
If it is not part of the social mix plan which led to the closure of the colleges of Reynerie, Raymond-Badiou, and Bellefontaine, in favor of new establishments with wider recruitment, Vauquelin intends to open up too. And digital is a lever. “Our objective is that parents from more privileged backgrounds say to themselves: something is happening here, and that they educate their children” rather than trying to avoid the establishment, privileged the rector. “Social diversity is the keystone for these students, educational success and the society we want to build. »
Downsizing
“50% of families who send their children to school in Vauquelin are disadvantaged compared to an average of 30% in Haute-Garonne. Vauquelin is not ghettoized but it is not mixed, ”says Georges Méric. Hence this digital experiment to which the county council contributes. This is one of the levers resulting in the addition of the drop of 200 students in this new school year thanks to a new school map and the renovation of the premises scheduled for 2023. Vauquelin has 640 students in this new school year.
The digital project did not start from nothing. It was born from the experience of the teachers who built this program. “The digital college is not the computer college,” explained one of the teachers involved in the experiment. This project, carried out in an interdisciplinary way, is based on four axes, summarized the principal, Jean Chevalier: the discovery of the digital tool, the new professions it offers, that also of citizenship and sustainable development.
As part of this option, students will be led to design digital programs, video games, to discover data encryption… Which will also lead them to explore other fields: robotics, space, artificial intelligence…