Making the day-to-day management of schools and their heads easier: that was our goal with the reduction in the number of school circulars, which came into effect on 1 February.
Minister of Education Valérie Glatigny had introduced a new simplification process in response to repeated requests from the education sector, particularly from school heads who felt circulars were too numerous and hard to prioritise (there were indeed more than 400 before 2020, and 224 in 2022, more than the 180 school days in a year).
It was thus decided that each target recipient (or “typical user”) would receive a maximum of 100 circulars per school year. This cap represents significant relief for schools, allowing them to focus on their main mission: teaching.
Today, with an average of just over 50* circulars received per recipient during this 2024-2025 school year, we can say: promise kept!
As a reminder:
In addition to reducing the number of circulars, a “colour code” was also introduced to make it easier to identify circulars according to their priority and nature:
- Red: circular to be implemented immediately
- Blue: annual start-of-year circulars
- Green: instructions for day-to-day organisation, requiring no immediate action
- Grey: purely informational content
“The drastic reduction in the number of circulars, as I had pledged, is not a cosmetic measure. It reflects our determination to respond to the collective request from school heads for real administrative simplification, so they can refocus on their teaching duties, and in particular to make circulars more relevant and better suited to realities on the ground. We will of course continue this work so that circulars are also better written and easily understandable for school heads”, stresses Valérie Glatigny.
*For example:
A WBE primary school head has received 48 circulars to date; in secondary school: 52 circulars; in specialised secondary school: 42 circulars.
A subsidised official primary school head: 58 circulars; in secondary school: 57 circulars; in specialised secondary school: 47 circulars.
A subsidised denominational free-education primary school head: 55 circulars; in secondary school: 56 circulars; in specialised secondary school: 46 circulars.
Some recipients may have received more circulars, as they voluntarily signed up for mailings that do not directly concern them.
The circulars concerned are those sent by the Cabinet of the Minister of Education and by the AGE, not mailings decided by school governing bodies (PO).