Mindfulness in Education – A Profile of Stéphane Justeau
Although it is a little-recognized aspect of higher education in France, pedagogy is the guiding principle of Professor Stéphane Justeau. The director of the Institute of Advanced Pedagogy at the ESSCA business school in Angers spoke at a CSIP MUSE workshop focused on student engagement.
A few minutes of meditation at the beginning and end of each class. This practice isn’t taking place at a California yoga studio, but in a classroom at the École supérieure des sciences commerciales d’Angers (ESSCA). It’s the class of Professor Stéphane Justeau, director of the school’s Institute of Advanced Pedagogy. The dean of the faculty thus came to present mindfulness meditation in a workshop on “strengthening students’ attention” offered by MUSE’s Center for Support of Pedagogical Innovations (CSIP) in mid-December 2020.“This unconventional session is part of our strategy to prioritize experimental approaches,” explains Patrizia Tavormina, an educational engineer at the CSIP, “but I admit I was a little worried about how the invitation to meditate with their students would be received by the participating teachers.”
A mandatory certificate
“In addition to the lack of pedagogical training, teaching isn’t valuedamong Professors,” laments Stéphane Justeau. Peers and, more broadly, the institution recognize a good publication but not a good course. This state of affairs began to bother the economist early on. Especially since a culture of pedagogy exists elsewhere, particularly in Anglo-Saxon countries.“In the United Kingdom, a teaching certificate is mandatory to teach in higher education,” explains the ESSCA professor. “This is changing very gradually in France; doctoral schools are beginning to offer pedagogy courses to their doctoral students.”
He quickly discovered he had a knack for teaching, starting with his part-time work as a graduate student at the university. This was especially true since his research on the impact of migration flows on wages and employment strained his relationships with some colleagues.“Under the pretext that my topic was supposedly reactionary, when in fact I just wanted to provide scientific insights into these issues. It was a difficult accusation to bear,” he says. After earning his PhD in economics in 1998, he secured a professorshipProfessor ESSCA. His affinity for teaching was confirmed: “I’ve always loved explaining and sharing knowledge, but also interacting with young people.”
He was quickly appointed head of the department—where he coordinates courses in economics, law, and mathematics—and is in a prime position to hear his colleagues’ complaints about students who are “not as good as they used to be,” “unable to concentrate,” and so on. These complaints exasperate him and prompt him to open his classroom to them to share his approach,“which was already working pretty well,”he says with quiet satisfaction.
The students can't get enough of it
Little by little, his dedication to teaching earned him an offer from the administration to lead a teaching center within the school. So off he went to train at the Lausanne Teaching Center, a leading institution in Europe. As a champion of teaching at his school, he returned to take on his new responsibilities. This involved providing training in pedagogy—particularly online—as well as offering individualized educational counseling. Regarding distance learning, he remarked in passing,“It offers fantastic opportunities, especially thanks to international openings. But it is certainly not the future of education, as it lacks a socio-emotional dimension that is essential to learning.”
This is an aspect he incorporates into his teaching approach. For him, the ultimate goal of a teacher is to capture students’ attention:“It’s a fundamental pillar. Without it, there’s no learning.” This is a challenge in the age of connected devices and social media, where students face constant and multiple distractions. Since he practices meditation—and since it is recognized in scientific literature for improving attention—he has decided to incorporate it into his classes (seearticle). “Mindfulness meditation is listed in the Vidal, the doctors’ bible,” points out the man who doesn’t want to come across as a crackpot.
"The first step isn't easy," he readily admits. At a time when the prevailing ethos is all about efficiency and speed, try convincing students to close their eyes and listen to their breathing. But the practice is well received, and his students keep coming back for more. And he takes the experiment further by sharing it in his teacher training workshops, which he organizes around the exchange of best practices.
Laurence Weil, a professor at the Montpellier Law School and a participant in the MUSE workshop, makes no secret of her disbelief: “This proposal struck me as unbelievable, as if it came from a parallel universe or the22nd century. There’s also a certain audacity in intruding on young people’s privacy, which feels very out of step with the times. But at the same time, it makes me reflect on my own practice and opens up new horizons that bring a renewed sense of wonder to our profession!”