The CREA2.1 project offered a linguistic and cultural immersion for staff in bilingual schools to develop their professional and linguistic skills, gain confidence in their English language skills and acquire new teaching tools and methods. The diversity of the profiles represented (school and City of Paris teachers, directors, City education officers, activity leaders, ASEMs, caretakers, canteen workers) was a stimulating factor. By supporting the staff of the academy and the City of Paris in their desire for training, the project aimed to develop a common work and training culture, to create a real dynamic between these staff and a social fabric within the school in order to facilitate joint work around this linguistic project, and by multiplying effect to encourage the early learning of foreign languages. The project also aimed to contribute to the European and international opening of the schools in the consortium. In general, CREA2.1 aimed to improve the teaching and learning of languages and to create a European area of education and training.
In response to the report on the attractiveness of the academic region Île de France, which is a longstanding territory of experimentation in bilingual immersion, the “Académie de Paris” and the direction for school affairs of the City Council of Paris (DASCO) are working together to develop public bilingual pre-primary and primary schools. A three-year plan has thus been designed to assist and support the opening of such bilingual schools in English combining immersive practices in the foreign language during school, extra-curricular and after-school time. Teaching of the language and in the foreign language, through physical, artistic and cultural education, is being set up. Within the teams, needs for linguistic and intercultural training for school teachers and City of Paris staff were identified, as well as pedagogy for teaching the language and teaching in the language. These schools also expressed a shared need for support in European and international outreach. The consortium has been built around the “Académie de Paris”, the City of Paris, and the pre-primary and primary schools that are involved in this progressive development of bilingual schools.