Teacher contracts will not be renewed. An support unit will be activated to help their children in their re -enrollment procedures.
Decision You Computer Community The Atted Lex 15 Avril
Here is the press release sent by the bourgmestre of Attert after this meeting late this Wednesday evening.
The Secondary School of the Attert Valley (ESVA), located in Tontelange since 2021 and based on active and alternative pedagogy, will close at the end of the 2024-2025 school year, August 25, 2025.
Despite a strong commitment from the commune of Attert, the educational team and several parents in favor of an innovative school offer adapted to the specific needs of certain young people, the combination of administrative, financial and regulatory constraints makes this closure inevitable today.
This decision taken in the municipal council of April 15, 2025 is based on several formal observations of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation drawn up on various occasions.
At present, 138 students are educated on the establishment. Depending on the verification report, the counting of October 1, 2024 only retains 71 students regularly registered. Indeed, encoding errors of several registration files prevented the official recognition of part of the students in school. The supervision supported by the Wallonia-Brussels Federation is directly linked to it. This situation led the Wallonia-Brussels Federation to refuse the salary care of some of the staff members.
In addition, currently it is clear that the regulatory target of 450 students to be achieved in the eight years following the opening of a new establishment cannot be fulfilled.
In addition, several official letters addressed by the general management of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation in the organizing power have highlighted the lack of viability of the 2nd and 3rd degrees, highlighting the structural difficulties encountered since the start of the 2022 school year. This is how the organizing power had to introduce, in recent years, several requests for derogation from the standards of maintenance. These were accepted, sometimes exceptional by the Wallonia-Brussels Federation. However, these successive derogations could not constitute a long -term lasting solution and are now exhausted. “
Too heavy financially for the small town of Attert
The municipality of ATERT continues in its press release: “The mail of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation of December 4, 2024, for its part, explicitly asked the organizing power to put an end to the contracts of non-subsidized personnel and to reimburse the unduly paid amounts. It is also stipulated that:
• “The 2nd degree of secondary education should therefore be closed at the end of the 2024-2025 school year and no more students can be registered in the 3rd year at the start of the 2025-2026 school year.”
• “Considering therefore that the 3rd degree did not reach the standard of creation of 21 students dated October 1, 2024, the 3rd degree of secondary education must be closed at the end of the 2024-2025 school year and no more students can be registered in 5th for the start of the school year 2025-2026.”
However, in order to allow the continuation of the current school year for registered students, the Communal Attert College has chosen to ensure, on equity, staff remuneration for the year 2024-2025, notwithstanding the lack of recognition by the Federation. This exceptional measure represents a cost of 460,000 euros for the municipality.
The overall financial result of the ESVA over the period 2021-2025 amounts to an amount of around 2.4 million euros, including:
• The revenues and expenses recorded between 2021 and April 2025, for a total of 1.5 million euros;
• The charges still to be covered in 2025 (wages on equity, rentals and purchases of modular space), estimated at 850,000 euros.
A substantial budgetary effort for the municipality of Attert, which, although having always displayed its desire to support quality education on its territory, cannot reasonably continue to allocate such resources to a single establishment without compromising the municipal financial balance and the sustainability of other municipal schools. “
No merger possible with another establishment
“With the objective of continuing the educational project carried out by ESVA, the communal college of Attert has initiated multiple approaches to several neighboring secondary establishments, thus exploring the possibility of a merger. Despite very constructive exchanges, none of the solicited schools could give a favorable follow -up to this proposal, in particular due to multiple administrative, logistical and/or financial constraints.
The members of the communal college would also like to thank the management and the organizing powers of these schools as well as the agents of the FWB education department for their availability and their involvement in the search for perennial solutions.
In view of all of these elements, the municipal council made this April 15 a decision made inevitable by the circumstances.
The organizing power will do everything to ensure support for the students and teachers concerned by this closure, whether in the search for a new establishment or in the definition of a new professional project.
The organizing power would like to warmly thank management, teachers, students, families and all the partners who contributed, with energy and conviction, to this great school adventure. The organizing power nourishes the hope that this initiative, although forced to go out, can serve as potting soil for future educational seeds “, ends Luc Quirynen, on behalf of the Communal College of Attert.
