Back to Rigour: French Education Minister Under Fire for Enforcing Spelling and Grammar in Exams
20th May 2026
The French minister for education, Édouard Geffray, has made headlines following a sensational statement: putting an end to decades of laxity in this area, he has announced that spelling, grammar, and syntax will henceforth be fully taken into account when marking papers for the final-year exams, the Brevet and the Baccalaureate, taken by all young French people aged 15–18—effective June 2026. While we may welcome this U-turn, which puts a proper command of the language back at the heart of learning, the measure is not straightforward to implement and has sparked waves of outrage among pupils, their teachers, and their parents.