Karina arrived in France in March 2022, shortly after the start of the war, with her parents, sister, grandmother and aunt. A year later, the 13-year-old teenager is now in 4th grade, speaks French, has made “a lot of friends” in college and goes to judo after school.
“She tries to do her best to succeed but she always tells me that she misses our native country very much and that she is waiting for the war to be over,” her mother, Nvard, told BFMTV.com.
As of December 1, some 19,236 Ukrainian students were enrolled in French schools, more than half of them in primary schools, indicates the Ministry of the Interior. If, like Karina, some of these children managed to adapt to this new country, this new language and this new school system, for others, it is more difficult.
“He told us that his dad was at war”
Julien Delzon runs an elementary school in Cenon (Gironde), a town in the Bordeaux metropolis. It has six Ukrainian children in its classes – who arrived between October 2022 and the beginning of January 2023 – educated from CE1 to CM2.
“We have two very anxious children: one of them told us that his dad was at war,” he explains. “We can see that they sleep badly. When they arrive in the morning, they are very tired.”
These children “come from different regions of Ukraine but those from Kharkiv are much more marked”, he observes for BFMTV.com. “We don’t ask too many questions but we know that they lived through the bombings.”
During recess, the six children have become accustomed to meeting in the yard. “They form a small group,” adds the school principal. “They are very cute and very nice, but it’s still difficult for them to fit in. Learning the alphabet is long and difficult.”
“Almost everyone wants to go back”
In math and science workshops, things are going pretty well – many teachers have also testified to the high level of young Ukrainians in these subjects. But in history or geography, “they drop out”, regrets this school principal.
Every morning, from 9 a.m. to 10:30 a.m., these children are cared for in an educational unit for incoming allophone students (UPE2A) with a specialist teacher who teaches them the French language.
“Two children are really motivated with a great capacity for adaptation and assimilation of French”, assures Julien Delzon. “But the others have more difficulty being interested in what is offered to them.”
It must be said that most of these families wish to eventually return to Ukraine. “Their life project is (over there)”, summarizes Julien Delzon. But when will they be able to resume the course of their lives? “Not knowing when and if they will return home, if they will find their friends, their families, their fathers and their homes, I think that’s the hardest part,” said Julien Delzon.
“Almost everyone wants to go back”, abounds Alexandre Morlet, the president of the Saint-Germain-en-Laye branch of La Maison Ukrainiane. Every Wednesday afternoon, his association offers Ukrainian language and culture lessons to around thirty children aged 7 to 15 – who arrived in France between March and May 2022 – schooled between this town of Yvelines and Poissy.
“The idea is to make sure that they don’t lose track and don’t have too many academic delays when they return to Ukraine,” he sums up.
Often, the children even continue their Ukrainian schooling at a distance, with lessons and homework to do, notes Valentyna Khairulina. Leaving Dnipro with her 12-year-old daughter a month after the start of the war, this French teacher now accompanies Ukrainian middle and high school students in France. “They don’t want to let go of Ukraine,” she testifies for BFMTV.com.
In Cenon, the two CM2 students followed by Julien Delzon are thus absent four half-days a week due to videoconferences with their Ukrainian teachers.
A sometimes spectacular learning of French
In Saint-Vaury, in Creuse, integration was relatively faster for the fifteen children who arrived from Ukraine on March 17, 2022, in particular thanks to the solidarity of the inhabitants. “From April, they were all in school”, recalls for BFMTV.com Jacques Forgeron, co-president of the France-Ukraine Exchange Federation and president of the Creuse Corrèze association, which chartered a bus from Poland to bring these families to France.
French lessons were quickly offered by the association’s volunteers to parents and children alike. Today, families are housed in self-contained apartments after being hosted by locals.
Schooled from kindergarten to high school – “we also have two babies in nursery” – all the children take part in activities outside of school in the sports clubs of the town: badminton, basketball, judo, gymnastics or even dance – activities financed by collections from the association.
“Now the children understand and speak French perfectly. Their integration is quite exceptional,” says Jacques Forgeron.
“For the moment, we have no project”
A teacher in higher education in Ukraine, Oksana Zinkevych has become a French teacher for Ukrainian middle and high school students educated in France. She herself arrived in Creuse in March 2022 with her 13-year-old son – her husband remained in Ukraine.
The teenager now speaks fluent French – a language that was unknown to him – and has fully adapted to his 4th year program. It is only in Spanish – which he had never studied – that he still fishes a little.
“The principal of his college said that he was successful, that he could continue to study like other French children”, confides, relieved, Oksana Zinkevych.
But the boy also continues to study the Ukrainian program: “he doesn’t want to close any doors”, explains his mother.
Because even for those whose situation seems stabilized, the future remains uncertain. If Valentyna Khairulina was hired by the National Education and found an apartment in Guéret, she has not yet decided anything for her future and that of her daughter. “For the moment, we have no project”, she summarizes. “It’s complicated. We’ve been here for a year and we realize that we may still be here for a while.”
