HindustanTimes.com

Wednesday, September 3, 2003

First Muslim school opens in mainland France

Reuters
Lille, France, September 2

The first Muslim high school in mainland France opened its doors on Tuesday
with several female teachers and pupils wearing headscarves usually banned
from public schools in this majority Catholic country.

The private Lycee Averroes, named after a prominent 12th-century Islamic
philosopher from Spain, welcomed a dozen teenagers -- six boys and six
girls -- in its five-room premises above a mosque in the northern city of
Lille.

"Our teaching is in French, the teachers are all accredited, the programme
is the same as elsewhere, the class is co-ed and wearing the veil is allowed
for girls but not obligatory," said Makhlouf Mameche, deputy principal of
the school.

The school, which hopes to expand in coming years and is open to non-Muslims
as well, is financed mostly by donations from the faithful "without any
foreign support," he added.

Foreign support is a sensitive issue in France because some mosques financed
from abroad, mainly Saudi Arabia, are suspected of spreading radical Islam
among disaffected Muslim youths.

France, whose five million Muslims make Islam the country's second-largest
religion, created a special council earlier this year to maintain regular
contact with its fractured Muslim community and integrate it better into
society.

Rigorously secular public schools have alienated some Muslims by barring
headscarves, a growing trend among Muslim girls. About one-fifth of French
pupils attend private schools, but they are mostly run by the Catholic
Church.

"We are not a religious establishment but we offer Muslim culture as an
option," Mameche told journalists. Among the options are courses on Islam
and Arabic language lessons.

The teachers, six men and four women, have all taught in French high schools
before joining the new lycee, he added.

The school failed three times to get permission from local authorities to
operate before it finally won approval by going to national education
authorities. Mameche said approval came so late that the school could not
recruit more pupils this year.

The Lycee hopes to sign a contract with the French state to have it pay
teachers' salaries, as happens with Catholic and other private schools, he
added.

The only other Muslim school on French territory is on the Indian Ocean
island of Reunion, one of France's overseas departments.

© Hindustan Times Ltd. 2003.
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