In light of the growing social inequalities between secondary schools, the Ministry of National Education launched an initiative in 2016 aimed at strengthening social diversity in lower secondary schools through initiatives that bring together the educational community across some twenty pilot areas, including the Paris Academy.
It is within this framework that the Institute for Public Policy has established a research partnership with the City of Paris and the Paris Regional Education Authority. This collaboration led to the trialling of a new method for allocating pupils to address the challenges posed by the current school catchment area system in Paris: the proposed scheme involves establishing catchment areas shared by several lower secondary schools to diversify their social intake.
By its resolution of 30 January 2017, the Paris Council voted to create three multi-secondary-school catchment areas, which will affect around 700 pupils starting Year 7 in September 2017.The pairs of secondary schools grouped within these expanded catchment areas are, respectively, Hector Berlioz and Antoine Coysevox (18th arrondissement), Marie Curie and Gérard Philippe (18th arrondissement), and Henri Bergson and Édouard Pailleron (19th arrondissement).
