"When an adult enters the classroom, the students get up from their chairs."

Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso)It's exam day at the Lycée Française Saint-Exupéry in Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. Very close to the central market, a hub of commerce, bustle, and shouting, stands a wall with double barbed wire and little signage. From the outside, it doesn't look like a high school, but when you walk through the door, neither does it. There's very little activity and a lot of silence. In fact, it's Baccalaureate day. selectivity, an exam such as the selectivity that allows students to continue higher education and that puts an end to the stage of high school (equivalent to high school).

For twenty years, Cristina Picó (1973), born in Valencia, has been a Spanish teacher at the Saint-Exupéry Institute in Ouagadougou, which this year celebrates fifty years since its inauguration in 1975. By mid-June, classes have already ended, but the year hasn't. In fact, she has to mark the Baccalaureate exams, but not those of her own students, but rather those taken by students from French high schools in other countries, such as Senegal and the Ivory Coast, to avoid favoritism among the students.

This institute is part of a network of educational centers that the French government has spread throughout the world. In total, there are around 540 centers operating in 139 different countries. Each educational center follows the French educational system but adapts to the region. "We used to have split shifts, but after the terrorist attacks in the city in 2018, right near the school, we started with a continuous shift, which means we avoid a lot of comings and goings," says Cristina. So, the bell rings at 7:20 a.m., students and teachers have a half-hour lunch break at noon, and classes generally end at 2:10 p.m. "The truth is, we teachers have been asking for this for a while, because during the hot season, it's very difficult to teach and move around at 3:00 p.m.," she explains.

Spanish or German as a second language

Cristina is from Valencia, but has spent more than half her life in Burkina Faso. One of the options she found once she settled was working as a Spanish teacher, although she had studied communication. fifth (1st year of compulsory secondary education) students must choose a second language other than English. "Here we offer Spanish and German, but most prefer Spanish because it's more widely spoken, and soccer also plays a big role," Cristina explains. A language that, for example, isn't taught in the country's public schools but is in neighboring Ivory Coast, which leads the ranking of Spanish-speaking students in Africa.

"The standards are very high, and the truth is we have very few behavioral problems," she explains. "I'm not very familiar with the Spanish education system, but here respect for teachers is very important, and, for example, when an adult enters the classroom, the students get up from their chairs," she adds. Cristina is also the inclusion representative and assists families, students, and colleagues who are unsure how to deal with a student's personal situation, such as autism. Unlike other public and private schools in the country, students here do not wear uniforms, following the French model.

An institute (also) for traveling families

"Even if they change countries, the program and school system are the same, because otherwise there are students who must repeat years to adapt to a new educational model," Cristina explains. In fact, the school has around sixty nationalities, most of them from other African countries. These are students who come from families who travel every two or three years, so it's great for them to be able to follow the same school system, which doesn't disrupt their development and learning.

"We provide very personalized follow-up with each student," explains Cristina, who emphasizes the good relationship she has with all of them, although respect, she adds, "is also earned by each teacher in class." However, she dedicates hours of what she defines as PA (personal support) to follow-up with students who have the most difficulties or problems, since having a ratio of 23 or 24 students per class makes it easier to get to know everyone.

One of the things Cristina highlights is that, as teachers, they receive a lot of training and hold meetings in Dakar, the capital of Senegal, to learn about a specific topic. In recent years, teachers have also had to undergo training on security issues, following the terrorist attacks in the city in 2018. For example, classrooms have signs with an arrow indicating where to exit in case of evacuation, and they also have a printed document indicating what to do in case of an attack. "When there was the attack on the general staff [in 2018] very close to the center, they began to raise the walls, and it was a very anxious and uncertain time, but now we are calmer," she explains.

In all French high schools around the world, there are staff known as resident teachers, who are part of the French government, and local teachers, like Cristina. The former can work in any educational center in the world, and many of them change centers and countries approximately every three years. "Nowadays, there aren't too many residents who want to come, because it's a destination known as non-family," she explains. This means that the person must travel alone, a measure that also applies to other international organizations present in the country for security reasons.

Cristina emphasizes the influence that the Parents' Association (APE, in its French acronym) has in decision-making, which runs the center together with the management team.