Yesterday, at the Prefectural Palace of Nice, the award ceremony for the departmental winners of the Resistance and Deportation competition took place. A ceremony marked by remembrance and memory.
Bright-eyed, red-cheeked, and wide smiles paraded before the well-filled audience in the festive hall of the Prefectural Palace of Nice. Teachers, school heads, students, parents, and a few elected officials had made the trip, not without dressing in their best.
During a ceremony presided over by Adolphe Colrat, prefect of the Alpes-Maritimes, ninety students (middle and high school) received a total of forty-five prizes. Six first prizes were awarded by the prefect (compared to four last year), as well as the second, third, and fourth prizes and the originality prizes. The awarded works were divided into two categories: individual works and collective works.
An establishment prize was also awarded to the one that brought the most winners. The CIV of Valbonne won the high school prize with twelve awarded students.
Michel-Jean Floc’h, representing the rector of the Academy of Nice, wanted to remind that “all participating students receive a prize”. He then highlighted “the quality of the proposed works”.
In the absence of Solange Rodrigues, the president of the jury of the Resistance and Deportation Competition, prefect Adolphe Colrat congratulated all participants and stated that “his last conversation with the German consul in Marseille was so warm that he wondered how France and Germany could have gone to war”. According to him, “reconciliation does not mean forgetting”.
The subject of this year’s competition was: “Resisting through arts and literature in prison and camps”. The prizes awarded consisted of several books on Resistance and Deportation, a medal, a pin, a diploma, as well as a pamphlet.
Sara Balden, winner of the first high school collective prize as well as a third individual prize, had difficulty concealing her pride by mentioning “the extensive research on the Internet, in books, and quite a few sleepless nights” to complete the collective dissertation in time. On an individual level, the student presented an essay “in the form of a reflection on the role of art in resistance”, not forgetting to draw a parallel with recent events, such as Charlie Hebdo or the November 13 attacks.
Florent Corniquel and Lorenzo Pugliese also shared their work experience: “We completed the dissertation in a week, but we did it thoroughly; we are very proud.” The two teenagers then shared a funny anecdote: “We started as six and three backed out at the start of the project. When they saw how fast we were moving, they wanted to rejoin the group”.
As for the master of ceremony, Jean-Louis Panicacci, vice-president of the competition jury and a World War II specialist, he explained the addition of a new category: “This is the first year that an audiovisual prize is awarded. Students make short films where they stage themselves, add period videos, and even maps. We then watch the films in advance, and the committee selects the winners together”.
Jean-Louis Panicacci then congratulated a student who built and presented a radio set from that era, in which a projector and a music box playing “Le chant des partisans” were also constructed, adding that “this reconstruction is a remarkable extension of a traditional work”. Moreover, the middle school student was awarded an originality prize.
The best works will be forwarded to the national jury and studied during the summer. The national ranking will be unveiled in October, and the national award ceremony will take place in Paris in December.
