Collège Lycée International Cévenol
Encyclopedia
The Collège Cévenol—now known as Le Collège-Lycée Cévenol International—is a unique and historic international secondary school located in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon
, in the département of Haute-Loire
, France
. It enrolls day students from the local area, along with a substantial body of regional, national, and international students from around the world who board at the school. The current President of its governing board (the AUCC) is Claude Le Vu; its current director is Philippe Bauwens.
The Collège Cévenol was founded in 1938 by local Protestant activists and pacifists, and has been shaped from its beginnings by the area’s long-standing traditions of resistance to political and religious oppression. From the beginning, the Collège has promoted education linked to principles of nonviolence
and the development of mutual understanding and solidarity in a socially and ethnically diverse society. The school’s founders were also key organizers of the now-famous community effort, in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, to shelter and save Jewish refugees during the Second World War. Thus an important part of the school’s early development is linked to this much discussed episode.
During its early years, from 1938 to 1971, the school was entirely private, and was associated with the Protestant Reformed Church of France
, although it welcomed students regardless of their religious or non-religious orientation. From 1971 on, it has become part of the French national education system and is secular. It is currently organized as an “établissement privé sous contrat d'association” (a private school associated by contract with the state), a category of French schools that are privately managed, but bound to the national system by contracts which provide basic funding and teacher's salaries, and require adherence to national curricula and other standards.
mountains," a nearby mountain range that is historically significant as a site of resistance for French Protestants. Chambon and the Collège are not located in the Cévennes themselves, but just to the north, on the high Plateau Vivarais-Lignon. The "Cévenol" reference in the school's name is thus cultural and historical rather than literal, situating the school's founding within the long heritage of French Protestant (Huguenot
) resistance to persecution after the Reformation, for example during the Camisard
wars of the early eighteenth century. The peasant fighters called “Camisards” who struggled against the French crown were also known as “Cévenols” after the rugged, mountainous terrain that facilitated the small group’s ability to resist the much larger forces arrayed against them. In the 1930s, this long-standing regional tradition of resistance and hospitality to refugees became essential to the school's beginnings.
In May 1938, at a regional synod of the French église réformée (the Reformed Church of France
, historically the primary Protestant council in France), pastor André Trocmé
, then assigned to the Protestant church in Chambon, proposed the creation of a new secondary school. His proposal envisioned a school that would address four goals:
With the help of Edouard Theis, another local pastor, the school’s first classes were held in September 1938. On its first day, the school had four teachers and 18 students, and met in a room in the Protestant “Temple” or church of Chambon.
By the late 1930s, Chambon had become the site of several “pensions” or boarding-houses that lodged children drawn from refugee camps in the south of France for victims of the Spanish Civil War
. The first pension, organized by Trocmé, was Les Grillons (Crickets), followed by several more, mostly funded by major international relief organizations. More refugees from the German occupation soon followed, including many Jewish children who were lodged and hidden among the others. During the course of the war, Chambon’s remote location made it attractive for other children from more war-torn areas of France as well, and the student body (including Jewish children being hidden in Chambon) grew rapidly, from 40 students in 1939 to 150 in 1940, 250 in 1941, 300 in 1942, and 350 to the end of the war.
In this situation, André and Magda Trocmé, along with Edouard and Mildred Theis served as both teachers at the Cévenol school and leaders of the town’s collective effort to protect the refugees. In recognition of their courage and leadership, they, along with Roland Leenhardt (a future director of the school who was then a pastor in the neighboring village of Tence
) and the people of Chambon, were later honored as “Righteous among the Nations
” (sometimes translated as “Righteous Gentiles”), a secular award given by the State of Israel to distinguish non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis. Chambon was, in fact, the first community to be recognized in this manner by Yad Vashem
.
, among others) and organized work-camps at which the school's teachers and students, along with other volunteers, passed the summers living in large tents while they built the present school with their own hands, from clearing roads and digging trenches for pipes, to building a classroom building, dormitories, and fields for sports. For decades, the original stone farmhouse, called Luquet, housed a makeshift gym, library, refectory, and offices; the refectory is still housed there today. The first dormitories were prefabricated wooden chalets donated by friends of the school in Sweden. The “Batisco” or Batiment Scolaire (the main classroom building used today) was opened in 1953; the science labs in 1957; and a new, relatively comfortable girl’s dormitory (Milflor) in 1959.
In its first decades especially, the Collège developed a collective culture distinct from that of other secondary schools. It was a co-educational school from the beginning; male and female students were mixed together in a manner that was relatively rare in French schools, and especially in French boarding schools. The school was open in both a material and an educational sense: it had no walls or gates, and students were encouraged and expected to govern themselves to a significant extent. The school’s pacifist and activist origins, its summer work-camps, remote location, and somewhat spartan living conditions for boarding students, encouraged a situation in which teachers and students lived, ate, and worked together in the same modest setting, relatively isolated from the aggressively consumerist and mediatic culture of the early cold war
.
Through the 1960s, students and teachers together developed a community that, within the limits imposed by the school’s Protestant orientation, emphasized tolerance and independence vis-à-vis dominant ways of thinking. Activities that were relatively rare for the period, such as a student-run assembly, radio station, and magazine, were initiated during these years. Notable teachers during this early period included the philosopher Paul Ricoeur
and the writer and nonviolence activist Lanza del Vasto
, one of the principle western followers of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Notable students from the early years include Alexander Grothendieck
, one of the key mathematicians of the twentieth century and a dedicated anti-war activist who had escaped the camps as a child refugee in Chambon during the war, and Delphine Seyrig
, an actress and activist now remembered for her roles in a series of important films in the 1960s and 1970s.
Currently the Collège enrolls students from about 30 different nations each year, working in classes from the Quatrième (the equivalent of 9th grade in the U.S.) to Terminale (the 13th and final or "terminal" year in the French primary-secondary system, during which students prepare for the Baccalauréat
examination). It continues to play a role in the local hosting and relief of refugees from conflicts in the Balkans and Eastern Europe.
Cévenol maintains active partnerships and exchange agreements with several other secondary schools oriented toward international education:
(information for applications, enrollment, calendar, etc.)
American Friends of the Collège Cévenol (in English): http://www.cevenolfriends.org/
(information on summer workcamp program)
French Alumni site for the history of the Collège (in French): http://collegecevenol.pasteur.ch/
(information on meetings; reminiscences, photos, etc.)
The Collège Cévenol Forever (in French) : http://www.collegecevenol.org/
(information on present and future of College)
Boismorand, Pierre, ed. Magda et André Trocmé: Figures de résistances. Texts selected and edited par Pierre Boismorand. Preface by Lucien Lazare. Paris: Editions du Cerf, 2008. (A French-language collection of excerpts from the writings of Magda and André Trocmé)
Bolle, Pierre, ed. Le Plateau Vivarais-Lignon: Accueil et Résistance, 1939-1944. Actes du Colloque du Chambon-sur-Lignon. Le Chambon-sur-Lignon: Société de l'Histoire de la Montagne, 1992.
Debiève, Roger. Mémoires meurtries, mémoire trahie: Le Chambon-sur-Lignon. Paris: L'Harmattan, 1995.
Flaud, Annik & Gérard Bollon, préface de Simone Veil. "Paroles de Réfugiés, Paroles de Justes." Le Cheylard : Editions Dolmazon, 2009.
Fox, Deborah. "Magda Trocmé: A Mother Responds, "Hineni!" Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 24.3 (2006), 90-99.
Hallie, Philip. Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed: The Story of Le Chambon and How Goodness Happened There. New York: Harper & Row, 1979.
Hatzfeld, Olivier. Le Collège Cévenol a Cinquante Ans. Le Chambon-sur-Lignon: Collège Cévenol, 1989.
Henry, Patrick (Patrick Gerard). "Banishing the Coercion of Despair: Le Chambon-sur-Lignon and the Holocaust Today." Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 20.2 (2002), 69-84.
McIntyre, Michael. "Altruism, Collective Action, and Rationality: The Case of Le Chambon." Polity 27.4 (1995), 537-557.
Paldiel, Mordecai. The Path of the Righteous: Gentile Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust. Hoboken: KTAV Publishing, 1993.
Rochat, François and André Modigliani. "The Ordinary Quality of Resistance: from Milgram's Laboraory to the Village of Le Chambon." Journal of Social Issues 51.3 (1995), 195-210.
Sauvage, Pierre, with Magda Trocmé, Philip Hallie, Hans Solomon, Hanne Liebmann, Rudy Appel. "Le Chambon." In Carol Rittner and Sondra Myers, eds., The Courage to Care: Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust (New York: New York University Press, 1986), 99-121.
Fiction, memoir, and young adult books
Boegner, Philippe. Ici on a aimé les Juifs. Paris: J.C. Lattès, 1982. (A memoir-novel).
DeSaix, Deborah Durland and Karen Gray Ruelle. Hidden on the Mountain: Stories of Children Sheltered from the Nazis in Le Chambon. New York: Holiday House, 2007. (Stories of Chambon hidden children, with many historical photographs).
Lecomte, François. I Will Never Be Fourteen Years Old: Le Chambon-sur-Lignon and My Second Life. Tr. Jacques Trocmé. Wayne PA: Beach Lloyd Publishers, 2009. (Memoir).
Lecomte, François. "Jamais je n'aurai quatorze ans." Paris : Le Manuscrit / Fondation pour la Mémoire de la Shoah, 2005.
Matas, Carol. Greater Than Angels. New York: Simon Pulse / Simon & Schuster, 1999. (Young Adult Fiction).
Films
Barnett, Barbara P. and Eileen M. Angelini. La France divisée. Rosemont PA: The Agnes Irwin School Holocaust Project, 2002. 36 minutes.
Gardner, Robert. The Courage to Care. USA: United Way Productions, 1985. 29 minutes. (Oscar-nominated in “short documentary” category, 1985).
Lorenzi, Jean-Louis. Le Chambon: La Colline aux Mille Enfants / The Hill of the Thousand Children. King Movies / Cameras Continentales, France 2, France 3 and others, 1994. 118 minutes. (Made-for-Television fictionalized feature film; International Emmy Award, Drama Category, 1996).
Sauvage, Pierre. Weapons of the Spirit / Les armes de l'esprit. (Documentary Film). USA/France: Chambon Foundation, 1987. 90 minutes. (Aired in the U.S. by PBS; Los Angeles Film Critics Association Special Award, 1987).
Also available in 35-minute version.
Vella, Pierre. Le Cévenol. (Documentary Film). France: France 3 Télévision, 2010. 30 minutes. First Broadcast 25 April 2010.
Le Chambon-sur-Lignon
Le Chambon-sur-Lignon is a commune in the Haute-Loire department in south-central France.Primarily a Huguenot town, it became a haven for Jews fleeing from the Nazis during World War II.-World War II:...
, in the département of Haute-Loire
Haute-Loire
Haute-Loire is a department in south-central France named after the Loire River.-History:Haute-Loire is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. It enrolls day students from the local area, along with a substantial body of regional, national, and international students from around the world who board at the school. The current President of its governing board (the AUCC) is Claude Le Vu; its current director is Philippe Bauwens.
The Collège Cévenol was founded in 1938 by local Protestant activists and pacifists, and has been shaped from its beginnings by the area’s long-standing traditions of resistance to political and religious oppression. From the beginning, the Collège has promoted education linked to principles of nonviolence
Nonviolence
Nonviolence has two meanings. It can refer, first, to a general philosophy of abstention from violence because of moral or religious principle It can refer to the behaviour of people using nonviolent action Nonviolence has two (closely related) meanings. (1) It can refer, first, to a general...
and the development of mutual understanding and solidarity in a socially and ethnically diverse society. The school’s founders were also key organizers of the now-famous community effort, in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, to shelter and save Jewish refugees during the Second World War. Thus an important part of the school’s early development is linked to this much discussed episode.
During its early years, from 1938 to 1971, the school was entirely private, and was associated with the Protestant Reformed Church of France
Reformed Church of France
The Reformed Church of France is a denomination in France with Calvinist origins. It is the original and largest Protestant denomination in France....
, although it welcomed students regardless of their religious or non-religious orientation. From 1971 on, it has become part of the French national education system and is secular. It is currently organized as an “établissement privé sous contrat d'association” (a private school associated by contract with the state), a category of French schools that are privately managed, but bound to the national system by contracts which provide basic funding and teacher's salaries, and require adherence to national curricula and other standards.
Founding as L’Ecole Nouvelle Cévenole
“Cévenol” is an adjective meaning "of the CévennesCévennes
The Cévennes are a range of mountains in south-central France, covering parts of the départements of Gard, Lozère, Ardèche, and Haute-Loire.The word Cévennes comes from the Gaulish Cebenna, which was Latinized by Julius Caesar to Cevenna...
mountains," a nearby mountain range that is historically significant as a site of resistance for French Protestants. Chambon and the Collège are not located in the Cévennes themselves, but just to the north, on the high Plateau Vivarais-Lignon. The "Cévenol" reference in the school's name is thus cultural and historical rather than literal, situating the school's founding within the long heritage of French Protestant (Huguenot
Huguenot
The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...
) resistance to persecution after the Reformation, for example during the Camisard
Camisard
Camisards were French Protestants of the rugged and isolated Cevennes region of south-central France, who raised an insurrection against the persecutions which followed the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685...
wars of the early eighteenth century. The peasant fighters called “Camisards” who struggled against the French crown were also known as “Cévenols” after the rugged, mountainous terrain that facilitated the small group’s ability to resist the much larger forces arrayed against them. In the 1930s, this long-standing regional tradition of resistance and hospitality to refugees became essential to the school's beginnings.
In May 1938, at a regional synod of the French église réformée (the Reformed Church of France
Reformed Church of France
The Reformed Church of France is a denomination in France with Calvinist origins. It is the original and largest Protestant denomination in France....
, historically the primary Protestant council in France), pastor André Trocmé
André Trocmé
André Trocmé and his wife Magda are a couple of French Righteous Among the Nations. For 15 years, André served as a pastor in the French town of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon on the Plateau Vivarais-Lignon in south-central France...
, then assigned to the Protestant church in Chambon, proposed the creation of a new secondary school. His proposal envisioned a school that would address four goals:
- work against the rural depopulation and impoverishment of Chambon, then a small farming village in an isolated mountain region;
- provide high-quality secondary education for the children of the area’s Protestant parishes;
- experiment with innovative educational ideas and practices that might eventually spread to the wider public school system; and
- provide a milieu in which teachers and students of different nationalities could meet and develop values related to internationalist ideals of cooperation and peace.
With the help of Edouard Theis, another local pastor, the school’s first classes were held in September 1938. On its first day, the school had four teachers and 18 students, and met in a room in the Protestant “Temple” or church of Chambon.
Shelter for refugees during World War II
Because of its relatively remote and protected location in Chambon, and because it was founded by the same pastors who became the leaders of local efforts to save refugees from Nazi occupation forces and the French Vichy regime that collaborated with them, the Cévenol school played an integral role in the now-famous efforts of the local citizenry in hiding and protecting several thousand Jewish refugees, including many children, throughout the war.By the late 1930s, Chambon had become the site of several “pensions” or boarding-houses that lodged children drawn from refugee camps in the south of France for victims of the Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...
. The first pension, organized by Trocmé, was Les Grillons (Crickets), followed by several more, mostly funded by major international relief organizations. More refugees from the German occupation soon followed, including many Jewish children who were lodged and hidden among the others. During the course of the war, Chambon’s remote location made it attractive for other children from more war-torn areas of France as well, and the student body (including Jewish children being hidden in Chambon) grew rapidly, from 40 students in 1939 to 150 in 1940, 250 in 1941, 300 in 1942, and 350 to the end of the war.
In this situation, André and Magda Trocmé, along with Edouard and Mildred Theis served as both teachers at the Cévenol school and leaders of the town’s collective effort to protect the refugees. In recognition of their courage and leadership, they, along with Roland Leenhardt (a future director of the school who was then a pastor in the neighboring village of Tence
Tence
Tence is a commune in the Haute-Loire department in south-central France....
) and the people of Chambon, were later honored as “Righteous among the Nations
Righteous Among the Nations
Righteous among the Nations of the world's nations"), also translated as Righteous Gentiles is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis....
” (sometimes translated as “Righteous Gentiles”), a secular award given by the State of Israel to distinguish non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis. Chambon was, in fact, the first community to be recognized in this manner by Yad Vashem
Yad Vashem
Yad Vashem is Israel's official memorial to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, established in 1953 through the Yad Vashem Law passed by the Knesset, Israel's parliament....
.
Second phase: building the Collège Cévenol
At the end of the war in 1945, a Collège Cévenol Association (now the AUCC or Association Unifiée du Collège Cévenol) was founded. In 1952 Carl and Florence Sangree, two Americans then associated with the school, founded the AFCC, The American Friends of the Collège Cévenol. A 16-hectare farm at the edge of Chambon was acquired as the site for a new campus. The American Association helped raise funds (from the Quaker American Friends Service CommitteeAmerican Friends Service Committee
The American Friends Service Committee is a Religious Society of Friends affiliated organization which works for peace and social justice in the United States and around the world...
, among others) and organized work-camps at which the school's teachers and students, along with other volunteers, passed the summers living in large tents while they built the present school with their own hands, from clearing roads and digging trenches for pipes, to building a classroom building, dormitories, and fields for sports. For decades, the original stone farmhouse, called Luquet, housed a makeshift gym, library, refectory, and offices; the refectory is still housed there today. The first dormitories were prefabricated wooden chalets donated by friends of the school in Sweden. The “Batisco” or Batiment Scolaire (the main classroom building used today) was opened in 1953; the science labs in 1957; and a new, relatively comfortable girl’s dormitory (Milflor) in 1959.
In its first decades especially, the Collège developed a collective culture distinct from that of other secondary schools. It was a co-educational school from the beginning; male and female students were mixed together in a manner that was relatively rare in French schools, and especially in French boarding schools. The school was open in both a material and an educational sense: it had no walls or gates, and students were encouraged and expected to govern themselves to a significant extent. The school’s pacifist and activist origins, its summer work-camps, remote location, and somewhat spartan living conditions for boarding students, encouraged a situation in which teachers and students lived, ate, and worked together in the same modest setting, relatively isolated from the aggressively consumerist and mediatic culture of the early cold war
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
.
Through the 1960s, students and teachers together developed a community that, within the limits imposed by the school’s Protestant orientation, emphasized tolerance and independence vis-à-vis dominant ways of thinking. Activities that were relatively rare for the period, such as a student-run assembly, radio station, and magazine, were initiated during these years. Notable teachers during this early period included the philosopher Paul Ricoeur
Paul Ricoeur
Paul Ricœur was a French philosopher best known for combining phenomenological description with hermeneutic interpretation...
and the writer and nonviolence activist Lanza del Vasto
Lanza del Vasto
Lanza del Vasto, , was a philosopher, poet, artist, catholic and nonviolent activist.He was born in San Vito dei Normanni, Italy and died in Elche de la Sierra, Spain....
, one of the principle western followers of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Notable students from the early years include Alexander Grothendieck
Alexander Grothendieck
Alexander Grothendieck is a mathematician and the central figure behind the creation of the modern theory of algebraic geometry. His research program vastly extended the scope of the field, incorporating major elements of commutative algebra, homological algebra, sheaf theory, and category theory...
, one of the key mathematicians of the twentieth century and a dedicated anti-war activist who had escaped the camps as a child refugee in Chambon during the war, and Delphine Seyrig
Delphine Seyrig
Delphine Claire Beltiane Seyrig was a stage and film actress and a film director.-Early life:...
, an actress and activist now remembered for her roles in a series of important films in the 1960s and 1970s.
Third and fourth phases: the Collège-Lycée Cévenol today
After 1971 the school became part of the French national education system and its culture gradually changed as the generation of organizers and activists formed during the extraordinary conditions of World War II resistance culture faded away. Primarily because it has never charged high tuitions and has never aimed to become an exclusive school for the wealthy, Cévenol has never been financially independent and relies on state funding to survive. After growing to an enrollment of about 500 during the 1980s and 1990s, the school encountered financial difficulties and its enrollment returned to around 300 after 1997. Since that time, the school has gradually improved its funding and seeks to renew its unique history and culture in the conditions of the 21st century.Currently the Collège enrolls students from about 30 different nations each year, working in classes from the Quatrième (the equivalent of 9th grade in the U.S.) to Terminale (the 13th and final or "terminal" year in the French primary-secondary system, during which students prepare for the Baccalauréat
Baccalauréat
The baccalauréat , often known in France colloquially as le bac, is an academic qualification which French and international students take at the end of the lycée . It was introduced by Napoleon I in 1808. It is the main diploma required to pursue university studies...
examination). It continues to play a role in the local hosting and relief of refugees from conflicts in the Balkans and Eastern Europe.
Cévenol maintains active partnerships and exchange agreements with several other secondary schools oriented toward international education:
- Concord AcademyConcord AcademyConcord Academy is a coeducational, independent, college preparatory school for grades nine through twelve, located in Concord, Massachusetts...
(MassachusettsMassachusettsThe Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
, USA) - Colegio Internacional Europa (Sevilla, SpainSpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
) - Goethe-Gymnasium/Rutheneum (GeraGeraGera, the third-largest city in the German state of Thuringia , lies in east Thuringia on the river Weiße Elster, approximately 60 kilometres to the south of the city of Leipzig and 80 kilometres to the east of Erfurt...
(GermanyGermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
) - Liceo Valdese de Torre PelliceTorre PelliceTorre Pellice is a comune in the Province of Turin in the Italian region Piedmont, located about 45 km southwest of Turin. It is crossed by the Pellice river....
(ItalyItalyItaly , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, a school associated with UNESCOUNESCOThe United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
) - Lycée Edmond-Maurice-Edmond de Rothschild de Tel AvivTel AvivTel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...
(IsraelIsraelThe State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
) - Soukromé Jazykové Gymnázium in Hradec KrálovéHradec KrálovéHradec Králové is a city of the Czech Republic, in the Hradec Králové Region of Bohemia. The city's economy is based on food-processing technology, photochemical, and electronics manufacture. Traditional industries include musical instrument manufacturing – the best known being PETROF pianos...
(Czech RepublicCzech RepublicThe Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....
)
Governing Board (AUCC) and school associations
The school's governing board is the Association Unifiée du Collège Cévenol (AUCC). Its meetings assemble representatives of alumni organizations and several French and international Protestant relief organizations. An Association des Anciens du Collège Cévenol (AACC) now provides organization for meetings and fundraising among alumni in France and Europe, beginning with a 70th Anniversary weekend held in Chambon in May 2009. The APCC (Association des Parents du CC) provides information and networking for parents of currently-enrolled students.American Friends of the Collège Cévenol (AFCC)
The American Friends, a non-profit organization founded in 1952, continues to unite alumni and friends of the Collège from all of the phases of the school’s history. It contributes to the school by organizing an annual fundraising drive among the school’s U.S. alumni and by continuing the tradition of the summer work camps that goes back to the school’s earliest years. The current work camps are three-week summer sessions organized for high school and college-age students who experience the atmosphere of Chambon and the Collège during the very pleasant summer season in the mountains, work at community service projects and basic maintenance or repair tasks at the school, and improve their French-language skills.Notable alumni and faculty
The French Wikipedia article on the Collège Cévenol provides French-language links to articles on many of these individuals:- Kate Barry (1967- ); photographer
- Guy Bechtel (1931- ); historian, author of numerous studies in French early-modern history and culture
- Pierre Bénichou (1938- ); journalist and writer, member of the Légion d'honneurLégion d'honneurThe Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
- Robert Benoît (1943- ); actor-director known for work in films, television, and theater; appeared alongside fellow Cévenol alum Delphine Seyrig in The Discreet Charm of the BourgeoisieThe Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie-External links:* at Rotten Tomatoes* * Roger Ebert's review of *...
(1972) - Christophe Berthonneau (1964- ); theater director, award-winning pyro-designer and founder of Group F, creator of major fireworks performances including opening and closing ceremonies of numerous Olympic Games during the 1990s and 2000s
- Émile BlessigÉmile BlessigÉmile Blessig is a member of the National Assembly of France. He represents the Bas-Rhin department, and is a member of the Union for a Popular Movement.-References:...
(1947- ); politician, currently a member of the National Assembly of France representing the Département of Bas-RhinBas-RhinBas-Rhin is a department of France. The name means "Lower Rhine". It is the more populous and densely populated of the two departments of the Alsace region, with 1,079,013 inhabitants in 2006.- History :... - Jacques Boré (1927- ); attorney and judge, elected a member of the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques in 1991
- Jean-Jacques Bourdin (1949- ); writer and sports journalist
- Jean-Louis Cheminée (1937–2003); geologist and volcanologist, director of the Volcanological Observatories of The Institute of Geophysics of Paris (IPGP, l'Institut de Physique du Globe de ParisInstitut de Physique du Globe de ParisThe Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris is a French governmental, non-profit research and higher education establishment located in Paris, dedicated to the study of earth and planetary sciences by combining observations, laboratory analysis and construction of conceptual analogical and...
) - Stéphane CourtoisStéphane CourtoisStéphane Courtois is a French historian, an internationally known expert on communist studies, particularly the history of communism and communist genocides, and author of several books...
(1947- ); historian and senior research scientist at the Centre National de la Recherche ScientifiqueCentre national de la recherche scientifiqueThe National Center of Scientific Research is the largest governmental research organization in France and the largest fundamental science agency in Europe....
(CNRS) - Catherine de Seynes (1930- ); film actress, playwright, and theater director, appeared in films by major directors Alain ResnaisAlain ResnaisAlain Resnais is a French film director whose career has extended over more than six decades. After training as a film editor in the mid-1940s, he went on to direct a number of short films which included Nuit et Brouillard , an influential documentary about the Nazi concentration camps.He began...
and Agnès VardaAgnès VardaAgnès Varda is a French film director and professor at the European Graduate School. Her movies, photographs, and art installations focus on documentary realism, feminist issues, and social commentary — with a distinct experimental style....
, and appears along with fellow Cévenol alumna Delphine Seyrig in Muriel, ou le temps d'un retour (1963) - Christiane Doré; Inspector-General of the Conseil Géneral des Technologies de l'Information (CGTI, the French national agency charged with oversight and reform of information technologies)
- Paul Dopff; filmmaker
- Elizabeth Fox-GenoveseElizabeth Fox-GenoveseElizabeth Ann Fox-Genovese was a feminist American historian particularly known for her writing about women in the Antebellum South...
(1941–2007); American historian, author of important studies in U.S. antebellum southern history and women's studies - Alexander GrothendieckAlexander GrothendieckAlexander Grothendieck is a mathematician and the central figure behind the creation of the modern theory of algebraic geometry. His research program vastly extended the scope of the field, incorporating major elements of commutative algebra, homological algebra, sheaf theory, and category theory...
(1928- ); German-born mathematical theorist and activist, renowned for important advances in alebraic geometry, number theory, and functional analysis; attended Cévenol as a hidden refugee during the war; awarded the Fields MedalFields MedalThe Fields Medal, officially known as International Medal for Outstanding Discoveries in Mathematics, is a prize awarded to two, three, or four mathematicians not over 40 years of age at each International Congress of the International Mathematical Union , a meeting that takes place every four...
for mathematics in 1966; declined the Crafoord PrizeCrafoord PrizeThe Crafoord Prize is an annual science prize established in 1980 by Holger Crafoord, a Swedish industrialist, and his wife Anna-Greta Crafoord...
in 1988. - John Woodland Hastings (1927- ); American biologist and Paul C. Manglesdorf Professor of Natural Sciences at Harvard University, elected in 2003 to the U.S. National Academy of SciencesUnited States National Academy of SciencesThe National Academy of Sciences is a corporation in the United States whose members serve pro bono as "advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine." As a national academy, new members of the organization are elected annually by current members, based on their distinguished and...
- Jean Hatzfeld (1949- ); journalist and novelist, winner of the Prix DécembrePrix DécembreThe Prix Décembre, originally known as the Prix Novembre, is one of France's premier literary awards. Its winners are generally far more radical choices than the more staid and conservative Prix Goncourt...
in 1994, the Prix Femina Essay prize in 2003, and the Prix MédicisPrix MédicisThe Prix Médicis is a French literary award given each year in November. It was founded in 1958 by Gala Barbisan and Jean-Pierre Giraudoux. It is awarded to an author whose "fame does not yet match his talent."...
literary prize in 2007 - Guy Lagache (1966- ); television journalist
- Lanza del VastoLanza del VastoLanza del Vasto, , was a philosopher, poet, artist, catholic and nonviolent activist.He was born in San Vito dei Normanni, Italy and died in Elche de la Sierra, Spain....
(Giuseppe Giovanni Luigi Enrico Lanza di Trabia; 1901–1981); philosopher, poet, artist, and nonviolence activist - François Lavondès (1932- ); political administrator and advisor to President Georges PompidouGeorges PompidouGeorges Jean Raymond Pompidou was a French politician. He was Prime Minister of France from 1962 to 1968, holding the longest tenure in this position, and later President of the French Republic from 1969 until his death in 1974.-Biography:...
- Roland Leenhardt (1913–1966); minister, third director of the Collège, and a co-organizer of Chambon-area resistance efforts, recognized as Righteous Among the NationsRighteous Among the NationsRighteous among the Nations of the world's nations"), also translated as Righteous Gentiles is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis....
- Jérôme Monod (1930- ); industrialist and politician, one of the architects of the RPR (Rally for the RepublicRally for the RepublicThe Rally for the Republic , was a French right-wing political party. Originating from the Union of Democrats for the Republic , it was founded by Jacques Chirac in 1976 and presented itself as the heir of Gaullism...
) party in the 1970s and of the UMP (Union for a Popular MovementUnion for a Popular MovementThe Union for a Popular Movement is a centre-right political party in France, and one of the two major contemporary political parties in the country along with the center-left Socialist Party...
) party in the 2000s, a close associate and advisor to President Jacques ChiracJacques ChiracJacques René Chirac is a French politician who served as President of France from 1995 to 2007. He previously served as Prime Minister of France from 1974 to 1976 and from 1986 to 1988 , and as Mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995.After completing his studies of the DEA's degree at the... - Paul Nahon (1947- ); television journalist and news director for the France 3France 3France 3 is the second largest French public television channel and part of the France Télévisions group, which also includes France 2, France 4, France 5, and France Ô....
network, current director as of 2009 for France 3 SudFrance 3 SudFrance 3 Sud is a regional television service and part of the France 3 network. Serving the Midi-Pyrénées and Languedoc-Roussillon regions from its headquarters in Toulouse, secondary production centre in Montpellier and newsrooms in Perpignan, Rodez, Albi and Nîmes, France 3 Sud broadcasts... - Franck Pavloff (1940- ); educator, editor and novelist, winner of the Prix France-Télévisions in 2005 for his novel Le Pont de Ran-Mositar
- Pierre Péchin (1947- ); comedian, radio announcer, and winner of several French comedy awards in the 1970s
- Olivier Philip (1925- ); cabinet minister under President Georges PompidouGeorges PompidouGeorges Jean Raymond Pompidou was a French politician. He was Prime Minister of France from 1962 to 1968, holding the longest tenure in this position, and later President of the French Republic from 1969 until his death in 1974.-Biography:...
, Prefect of several departments and regions from the 1950s to the 1980s, and member of the Légion d'honneurLégion d'honneurThe Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802... - Loïc Philip (1932- ); Writer, jurist, emeritus Professor of Law at the Université Paul Cézanne d' Aix-Marseille, elected to the Academie des Sciences Morales et Politiques in 2000
- Paul Ricœur (1913–2005); philosopher and a major figure in hermeneutic phenomenology, winner of the 1999 Balzan PrizeBalzan PrizeThe International Balzan Prize Foundation awards four annual monetary prizes to people or organisations who have made outstanding achievements in the fields of humanities, natural sciences, culture, as well as for endeavours for peace and the brotherhood of man.-Rewards and assets:Each year the...
for Philosophy and the second recipient, in 2003, of the Kluge PrizeKluge PrizeThe John W. Kluge Prize for the Study of Humanity is awarded for lifetime achievement in the humanistic and social sciences to celebrate the importance of the Intellectual Arts for the public interest.-Overview:...
for lifetime achievement in the human sciences - Gilles RoussiGilles RoussiGilles Roussi is a French sculptor.-External links:*...
(1947- ); sculptor, writer, and director of the École supérieure art & design de Saint-Étienne (School for Advanced Studies in Art & Design of Saint-Etienne) - Jérôme SavaryJérôme SavaryJérôme Savary is a French theater director and actor. His work has democratized and widened the appeal of musical theater in France, drawing together and blending such genres as opera, operetta, and musical comedy.- Biography :...
(1942- ); theater director, playwright, actor, member of the Ordre des Arts et Lettres and the Legion d'honneurLégion d'honneurThe Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802... - Simon Schakhine (1927- ); novelist, journalist, theatre director; attended Cévenol while hidden as French Jewish child refugee in Chambon during the war, before moving to Tel Aviv in the late 1950s and beginning a career as a francophone writer living in Israel
- Richard SeaverRichard SeaverRichard Woodward Seaver was an American translator, editor and publisher. Seaver was instrumental in defying censorship, to bring to light works by authors such as Samuel Beckett, Jean Genet, Henry Miller, William S. Burroughs, Hubert Selby, Eugene Ionesco, E.M. Cioran, D.H. Lawrence, Jack...
(1926–2009); American translator, editor, and publisher, influential as editor in chief of Grove PressGrove PressGrove Press is an American publishing imprint that was founded in 1951. Imprints include: Black Cat, Evergreen, Venus Library, Zebra. Barney Rosset purchased the company in 1951 and turned it into an alternative book press in the United States. The Atlantic Monthly Press, under the aegis of its...
, president and publisher of Holt, Rinehart and WinstonHolt, Rinehart and WinstonHolt McDougal is an American publishing company, a division of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, that specializes in textbooks for use in secondary schools. Holt, Rinehart and Winston was a division of Harcourt Education...
's trade division, and founder of Arcade PublishingArcade PublishingArcade Publishing is an independent trade publishing company that started in 1988 in New York, USA. They are publishers of American and world fiction and non-fiction... - Delphine SeyrigDelphine SeyrigDelphine Claire Beltiane Seyrig was a stage and film actress and a film director.-Early life:...
(1932–1990); actor-director and women's rights activist, best known for her work in important films such as Last Year in Marienbad, Stolen KissesStolen KissesStolen Kisses is a 1968 French film directed by François Truffaut. It continues the story of the character Antoine Doinel, whom Truffaut had previously depicted in The 400 Blows and the short film Antoine and Colette...
, The Discreet Charm of the BourgeoisieThe Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie-External links:* at Rotten Tomatoes* * Roger Ebert's review of *...
, and Jeanne Dielman - Robert StorrRobert Storr-Education:Robert Storr received his B.A. in History and French from Swarthmore College in 1972, and earned an M.F.A. in Art from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1978.-Career:...
(1949- ); American art critic, curator, and painter, named Dean of the Yale University School of Art in 2006, Director of the 2007 Venice BiennaleVenice BiennaleThe Venice Biennale is a major contemporary art exhibition that takes place once every two years in Venice, Italy. The Venice Film Festival is part of it. So too is the Venice Biennale of Architecture, which is held in even years... - Élizabeth Teissier (1938- ); model, television host, and astrologer
- Edouard Theis (1899–1984) and Mildred Theis; Edouard Theis and his wife Mildred, along with the Trocmés, were the earliest teachers at the school. Both were leaders of resistance organization in Chambon and recognized as Righteous Among the NationsRighteous Among the NationsRighteous among the Nations of the world's nations"), also translated as Righteous Gentiles is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis....
. Edouard served as the school's second director until his retirement in 1963. - André TrocméAndré TrocméAndré Trocmé and his wife Magda are a couple of French Righteous Among the Nations. For 15 years, André served as a pastor in the French town of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon on the Plateau Vivarais-Lignon in south-central France...
(1901–1971); André Trocmé was a minister, the school's founder and first director, and a leader of resistance organization in Chambon, recognized as Righteous Among the NationsRighteous Among the NationsRighteous among the Nations of the world's nations"), also translated as Righteous Gentiles is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis.... - Magda Trocmé-Grilli di Cortona (1901–1996); one of the school's first teachers and an area resistance activist in her own right, along with her husband André. Also recognized as Righteous Among the NationsRighteous Among the NationsRighteous among the Nations of the world's nations"), also translated as Righteous Gentiles is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis....
- Paul Trân Van Thinh (1929- ); Vietnamese-born economist and attorney, former French ambassador to the European CommissionEuropean CommissionThe European Commission is the executive body of the European Union. The body is responsible for proposing legislation, implementing decisions, upholding the Union's treaties and the general day-to-day running of the Union....
and head of the European UnionEuropean UnionThe European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
delegation to General Agreement on Tariffs and TradeGeneral Agreement on Tariffs and TradeThe General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade was negotiated during the UN Conference on Trade and Employment and was the outcome of the failure of negotiating governments to create the International Trade Organization . GATT was signed in 1947 and lasted until 1993, when it was replaced by the World...
(GATT) and World Trade OrganizationWorld Trade OrganizationThe World Trade Organization is an organization that intends to supervise and liberalize international trade. The organization officially commenced on January 1, 1995 under the Marrakech Agreement, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade , which commenced in 1948...
negotiations from 1960 to 1994 - Georges Vajda (1908–1981); Hungarian-born historian, pioneering figure in Jewish StudiesJewish studiesJewish studies is an academic discipline centered on the study of Jews and Judaism. Jewish studies is interdisciplinary and combines aspects of history , religious studies, archeology, sociology, languages , political science, area studies, women's studies, and ethnic studies...
, and director of Arabic and Hebrew Studies at the CNRS; driven into hiding in Chambon during the war, Vajda taught Greek and Latin at Cévenol and wrote his first important history while living in Chambon, before returning to Paris after 1946 to become director at the Haute Ecole des Etudes Pratiques, Section des Sciences Religieuses. - Laurent WauquiezLaurent WauquiezLaurent Wauquiez is a French politician and the current Secretary of State for European Affairs under the Foreign and European Affairs Minister, Alain Juppé....
(1975- ); politician active in the UMP (Union for a Popular MovementUnion for a Popular MovementThe Union for a Popular Movement is a centre-right political party in France, and one of the two major contemporary political parties in the country along with the center-left Socialist Party...
) party in the 2000s, as of 2010 Secretary of State for European Affairs under the Foreign and European Affairs Minister, Michèle Alliot-Marie; Wauquiez is also 2008-14 Mayor of Le Puy-en-VelayLe Puy-en-VelayLe Puy-en-Velay is a commune in the Haute-Loire department in south-central France.Its inhabitants are called Ponots.-History:Le Puy-en-Velay was a major bishopric in medieval France, founded early, though its early history is legendary... - Christian Zuber (1930–2005); filmmaker and animal rights activist, administrator for the World Wide Fund for NatureWorld Wide Fund for NatureThe World Wide Fund for Nature is an international non-governmental organization working on issues regarding the conservation, research and restoration of the environment, formerly named the World Wildlife Fund, which remains its official name in Canada and the United States...
(WWF) and the Bardot Foundation
External links and Web resources
Collège Cévenol official website (in French): http://www.lecevenol.org/(information for applications, enrollment, calendar, etc.)
American Friends of the Collège Cévenol (in English): http://www.cevenolfriends.org/
(information on summer workcamp program)
French Alumni site for the history of the Collège (in French): http://collegecevenol.pasteur.ch/
(information on meetings; reminiscences, photos, etc.)
The Collège Cévenol Forever (in French) : http://www.collegecevenol.org/
(information on present and future of College)
Print and visual resources on Chambon and the Collège during World War II
Historical scholarshipBoismorand, Pierre, ed. Magda et André Trocmé: Figures de résistances. Texts selected and edited par Pierre Boismorand. Preface by Lucien Lazare. Paris: Editions du Cerf, 2008. (A French-language collection of excerpts from the writings of Magda and André Trocmé)
Bolle, Pierre, ed. Le Plateau Vivarais-Lignon: Accueil et Résistance, 1939-1944. Actes du Colloque du Chambon-sur-Lignon. Le Chambon-sur-Lignon: Société de l'Histoire de la Montagne, 1992.
Debiève, Roger. Mémoires meurtries, mémoire trahie: Le Chambon-sur-Lignon. Paris: L'Harmattan, 1995.
Flaud, Annik & Gérard Bollon, préface de Simone Veil. "Paroles de Réfugiés, Paroles de Justes." Le Cheylard : Editions Dolmazon, 2009.
Fox, Deborah. "Magda Trocmé: A Mother Responds, "Hineni!" Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 24.3 (2006), 90-99.
Hallie, Philip. Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed: The Story of Le Chambon and How Goodness Happened There. New York: Harper & Row, 1979.
Hatzfeld, Olivier. Le Collège Cévenol a Cinquante Ans. Le Chambon-sur-Lignon: Collège Cévenol, 1989.
Henry, Patrick (Patrick Gerard). "Banishing the Coercion of Despair: Le Chambon-sur-Lignon and the Holocaust Today." Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 20.2 (2002), 69-84.
McIntyre, Michael. "Altruism, Collective Action, and Rationality: The Case of Le Chambon." Polity 27.4 (1995), 537-557.
Paldiel, Mordecai. The Path of the Righteous: Gentile Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust. Hoboken: KTAV Publishing, 1993.
Rochat, François and André Modigliani. "The Ordinary Quality of Resistance: from Milgram's Laboraory to the Village of Le Chambon." Journal of Social Issues 51.3 (1995), 195-210.
Sauvage, Pierre, with Magda Trocmé, Philip Hallie, Hans Solomon, Hanne Liebmann, Rudy Appel. "Le Chambon." In Carol Rittner and Sondra Myers, eds., The Courage to Care: Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust (New York: New York University Press, 1986), 99-121.
Fiction, memoir, and young adult books
Boegner, Philippe. Ici on a aimé les Juifs. Paris: J.C. Lattès, 1982. (A memoir-novel).
DeSaix, Deborah Durland and Karen Gray Ruelle. Hidden on the Mountain: Stories of Children Sheltered from the Nazis in Le Chambon. New York: Holiday House, 2007. (Stories of Chambon hidden children, with many historical photographs).
Lecomte, François. I Will Never Be Fourteen Years Old: Le Chambon-sur-Lignon and My Second Life. Tr. Jacques Trocmé. Wayne PA: Beach Lloyd Publishers, 2009. (Memoir).
Lecomte, François. "Jamais je n'aurai quatorze ans." Paris : Le Manuscrit / Fondation pour la Mémoire de la Shoah, 2005.
Matas, Carol. Greater Than Angels. New York: Simon Pulse / Simon & Schuster, 1999. (Young Adult Fiction).
Films
Barnett, Barbara P. and Eileen M. Angelini. La France divisée. Rosemont PA: The Agnes Irwin School Holocaust Project, 2002. 36 minutes.
Gardner, Robert. The Courage to Care. USA: United Way Productions, 1985. 29 minutes. (Oscar-nominated in “short documentary” category, 1985).
Lorenzi, Jean-Louis. Le Chambon: La Colline aux Mille Enfants / The Hill of the Thousand Children. King Movies / Cameras Continentales, France 2, France 3 and others, 1994. 118 minutes. (Made-for-Television fictionalized feature film; International Emmy Award, Drama Category, 1996).
Sauvage, Pierre. Weapons of the Spirit / Les armes de l'esprit. (Documentary Film). USA/France: Chambon Foundation, 1987. 90 minutes. (Aired in the U.S. by PBS; Los Angeles Film Critics Association Special Award, 1987).
Also available in 35-minute version.
Vella, Pierre. Le Cévenol. (Documentary Film). France: France 3 Télévision, 2010. 30 minutes. First Broadcast 25 April 2010.