The school will have Google-style premises in the heart of Paris, in a building still under construction that is known as “Heart of Code”, open all day and night. Its name, “42”, is the “answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything” in the (English) science-fiction classic, “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”. When the new school was unveiled, to great fanfare, Le Monde politely described it as “strange”.
Teaching methods will be based not on rote-learning but on self-learning. Nicolas Sadirac, 42’s Stanford-trained director, who wears the standard geek uniform of jeans and T-shirt, says the French school system instils knowledge, but not the right state of mind: it “trains people to be disciplined, but afraid of risk...yet tomorrow’s economy will all be about creativity.” Claudia Senik, of the Paris School of Economics, argues that French pessimism is “at least partly acquired in school”, where grading and selection reinforce it. High time for a healthy dose of what the French call la positive attitude.
