France's Macron seeks public school reform with school uniforms, national anthem
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00:00 In a rare address to the nation, Emmanuel Macron laid out a series of measures to strengthen France's education system.
00:07 Among them, testing out mandatory uniforms in schools.
00:11 The idea of a school uniform, which has created so much debate and which removes inequality between families while creating respect,
00:21 will be tested from this year onwards in around a hundred schools, all of them on a voluntary basis.
00:27 The testing phase will extend to 2026, after which the government will decide whether to generalize the measure.
00:36 Macron also wants to introduce a US-style graduation ceremony in middle school and in high school,
00:43 describing it as a Republican ritual of unity and a source of pride for students.
00:48 The president further stressed the importance of civic education, which he said would be doubled.
00:55 He also backed the idea of teaching the national anthem in primary school in order to reinforce Republican values among children.
01:03 Finally, Macron said he planned to make the general national service introduced in 2021 mandatory for high school students.
01:12 I'll be going over this in more detail in the coming weeks,
01:16 but we are aiming to generalize the general national service starting from the 10th grade.
01:23 Asked about the recurring problem of teaching vacancies and staff shortages,
01:28 which in recent days sparked a major controversy around France's education minister,
01:33 Macron vowed to tackle the issue.
01:35 He also pledged more training and better pay for teachers, without going into further details.
01:41 (laughing)