Does Learning to Ride a Bike at School in France Address Environmental Issues?

Against the background of the climate crisis, the transport sector is being targeted by policies aimed at encouraging low-carbon means of transport such as cycling. In France, teaching children to ride a bicycle is one approach being taken, following the creation in 2018 of the scheme Savoir Rouler à Vélo (Learn to Ride a Bike), SRAV for short. The scheme is run as part of the curriculum at primary school, an institution which, since the start of this century, has broadened its goals to educate pupils about the environment and sustainable development.

This study aimed to examine how much environmental issues were considered in the implementation of an educational policy encouraging children to learn to cycle.

The collection and analysis of the data were based on a qualitative methodology. Forty semi-structured interviews were carried out with participants in the SRAV scheme, to which were added approximately 100 h of observation. The three levels at which the public policy was implemented-at national, departmental and school level-were investigated. The field part of the study was complemented by documentary analysis.

The modes of the scheme's administration, which are reflected in the mechanisms that accompany the scheme, hamper the utilisation of the SRAV as a means to educate youngsters about climate change. The scheme's many different partners and the incompatibility of their perspectives on cycling, on the one hand, and the manner in which the skills developed by pupils at the end of a learning cycle are treated, on the other, illustrate these difficulties.

The government's policy to encourage children to learn to ride a bike-as represented by the SRAV scheme-runs up against obstacles when it comes to meeting the environmental challenge.