Guillaume Prévost, a new secretary general with an atypical profile

In the offices of Catholic education, located near the old Val-de-Grâce abbey, in Paris, Guillaume Prévost lingers on an ultramodern coffee machine. He still has to find the trick to make it work.

He is not used to, the new boss of the institution is just installed: like the two million students in which he is in charge, he is back on September 1.

The one who will be 43 years old on September 10 embodies the new face of Catholic education for the next three years – a jovial air, underlined by round glasses. He caught up in the game of presentations, sometimes in front of an audience of school directors, to reassure the profession. “I always preferred spontaneity, but now I have to prepare my speaking to avoid any misunderstanding,” he realizes, his cup finally served.

The forties, described by those around him as free and sociable, was previously general manager of the group of reflection Upwards (partner of the Bayard group, publisher of Pilgrim), where we had to capture the attention of politicians and journalists on questions of youth and education.

Do nothing to pass

He now learns to weigh each of his words. Especially since he took office for the first school year after the Betharram scandal took on a national magnitude last spring. While more than 200 former students of this Catholic establishment in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques filed a complaint for acts of sexual and physical violence between the 1950s and 2000s, the case took a political turn with the alleged silence of François Bayrou. The Prime Minister was at the time elected local and deputy of the Pyrénées-Atlantiques (from 1986 to 1993, from 1997 to 1999 and from 2002 to 2012), and had placed three of his six children in the establishment where his wife taught catechism.

Guillaume Prévost, who accepted the post in the middle of the media storm, will have to defend the interests and the image of Catholic education. “By his career, his knowledge of the functioning of the State, his personal commitment and his responsibility within the laboratory of ideas on education, he seemed to us to be prepared for the mission,” explains Archbishop Matthieu Rougé, bishop of Nanterre and president of the Catholic education council, which validated his appointment in April.

Training in the French Navy then ENA

His profile is out of the ordinary. Unlike his predecessors, Guillaume Prévost did not exercise any function in Catholic education. This Parisian is even a pure product of the Republican School – with the exception of a school year in the private sector. After studying philosophy and mathematics, the young Guillaume lets himself be seduced by the French Navy and embeds for missions of several months in the submarine.

During this confined life, he rubs shoulders with the discipline – twelve hours of minimum work, seven days a week – and goes up in grade. There is a reputation forge: not letting anything pass. “He couldn’t bear the lack of respect or the lack of professionalism. He did not hesitate to have stormy discussions with the sailors, without worrying about what we thought of him, “recalls a former non-commissioned officer chief of the quarter, who, after four months of mission with him in the Indian Ocean, saw him continue his way to politics.

Guillaume Prévost chooses to stay in the shadows. He left the uniform after eight years of service and joined, in 2016, the benches of the ENA (National School of Administration) before returning to the Ministry of National Education. But the evidence for this practicing Catholic and father of four children – he is due to this figure, even if the last one is still in his mother’s belly – is to join Catholic education.

Future

Guillaume Prévost welcomes the commitment of actors in the field, carried by their faith, although embedded by the Betharram affair. A scandal “appalling” and a “colossal” problem that of abuses on children in the church, he says, specifying however: “Our CAP, our compass, it is the Ciase*, Jean-Marc Sauvé, not the media excitement or the instrumentalization of facts for political purposes.”

In July, a parliamentary committee issued fifty recommendations on the terms of state control to prevent abuse and violence in school. Internates controlled each year, every five years for establishments without residents … Guillaume Prévost says he is favorable to several provisions. But he also hopes that the institution “looks towards the future”, and insists on major educational issues: vocations crisis, fall in the school level, difficulty in accessing employment … because he firmly believes: “Catholic education is a model for the 21st century.”

*Independent commission on sexual abuse in the church which made a shock report in 2021.