French court reinstates funding for Muslim high school Averroes

French court reinstates funding for Muslim high school Averroes

Private school Averroes was the first Muslim high school to open in mainland France in 2003 in Lille, and has offered students the regular French curriculum and also religion classes.

The administrative court in Lille has just overturned the decision of the prefecture of the North, which had annulled, in December 2023, the contract linking the private Muslim high school to the state. The educational team had so far stopped denouncing "unrighteousness". The ministry can still appeal.

French Muslim school re-allocated suspended state funding

A French court ruled that a Muslim school could continue to receive state subsidies after local authorities in 2023 cut funding over alleged "serious breaches" of teaching rules, the court and its management said.

While the Averroès high school has been deprived of subsidies since the beginning of 2024 after the prefecture accused him of "serious breaches of the fundamental principles of the Republic", the Lille administrative court decided to reinstate, with immediate effect, the contract of the Lille Muslim establishment with the state, considering that "the condition for the existence of serious breaches of the law was not fulfilled" and that "the proc…

He obtained the reinstatement of his contract of association with the State before the administrative court of Lille, after having again ordered the region to refuse subsidies.

The Lille Administrative Court re-established the Averroès High School's contract with the state, overturning a decision of the North Prefecture of 2023, citing a lack of evidence.