1. The certified: a body of 240,000 teachers…
1. The certified: a body of 240,000 teachers
The Capes is a public service competition and one of the main ways of accessing the teaching profession in secondary education (colleges and high schools). It competes with the aggregation competition, which is more difficult and offers better remuneration, and the CAPLP, its counterpart for teachers in vocational high schools.
It is estimated that around 240,000 the number of certified teachers, in other words holders of Capes. 65% of them work in college classes. The others in high school class.
The abolition of the competition would not lead to the disappearance of the status attached to it, but a gradual reduction in the share of certified teachers in the teaching body. It can be compared to the recruitment policies carried out at SNCF or La Poste, where the proportion of contract workers has increased considerably in a decade.
2. The end of “lifetime employment” for civil servants as an objective
The question that arises is that of the recruitment which would replace the Capes. The elements of language that have leaked from the outgoing president’s entourage also refer to the “end of lifelong employment”. Contracting, which the administration regularly uses, could be a substitute.
Contract teachers are currently estimated at 35,000 by the ministry. Until now, they were mainly used to meet replacement needs. It has increased significantly in recent years, in particular due to the Covid-19 crisis.
France, which until now only used contract teachers for 7% of the total workforce, is an exception compared to its main European neighbours: in Spain, teaching has 34% contract teachers, Italy 25%, Portugal and French-speaking Belgium 27%. In these countries, these contracts are generally for one year and renewable.
3. An idea that emerged under the mandate of Nicolas Sarkozy
This measure is to be placed in an older context with the reform begun under Nicolas Sarkozy’s five-year term, in 2010, known as the mastering of competitions. It was then a question of no longer basing the recruitment of teachers on the sole principle of a competition, but also on a specific diploma in teaching professions, set at bac + 5. Recognition of the ability to teach through a diploma gives the possibility of considering the abolition of the competition.