Abstract

Findings of the designated judge-rapporteur
(...)
On the merits,
(...) 9. In accordance with the settled and consistent case law of the Complaints Board, it clearly follows from those provisions that the choice of language section is not a matter for the parents alone but must result from a pedagogical assessment made by the school in the child’s best interests, in the light of the information provided by his or her parents and of the opinion of experts (see, amongst others, decisions 14/17 of 28 July 2014, 16/19 of 29 August 2016, 18/27 of 20 August 2018 and, more recently, reasoned order 19/02 of 15 March 2019).
The pedagogical assessment in question is a matter for the teachers, whom neither the CEA nor the Complaints Board can supersede, unless there has been a manifest error of assessment or infringement of the procedural rules established for the administration of tests.

10. In the case in point, the documents in the file show that:
- the applicants requested that their son be enrolled in the French language section;
- on the basis of the information provided by the applicants in the enrolment application, the school’s management had doubts about [...] dominant language and decided to test the child in French and Hungarian, pursuant to the aforementioned Article 47(e); the results of those tests showed that the child would be capable of being integrated into either language section, and it was finally decided that the enrolment could be accepted solely in the Hungarian language section ; this resulted from the findings that in Hungarian the child received a mark of 9 (“Distinctly above average”) on his Listening Skills, Speaking Skills, Vocabulary and Grammar which mark was that attributed in the conclusion of the Hungarian test, while with regard to the French language test he achieved similar marks with regard to Oral Comprehension (Listening Skills) and Speaking Skills, he achieved inferior marks of 8 in Vocabulary and Grammar and the overall conclusion was a mark of 8 in French as opposed to 9 in Hungarian.
- on the basis of the said results, the management decided, in the child’s interest, to offer him a place in the Hungarian language section, which suits him best;
- neither of the applicants made any complaint about the regularity of the said tests or about their conformity with the procedural rules established for their administration, nor did they allege that the comparative tests were flawed; it was only on sight of the results, which were contrary to their wishes, that the applicants, without contesting the circumstances in which the tests were conducted, seek a review of the decision of the school management;
- nor do the applicants base their case on any legal or regulatory provision, requiring the European Schools to repeat the test or not to take account of the results.

11. The designated judge-rapporteur cannot therefore discern in the arguments put forward by the applicants any ground allowing the tests to be regarded as irregular, invalid or flawed.
Finally, the applicants’ different interpretation of the test results cannot constitute a reason to invalidate them either, since, as the Complaints Board has emphasised in its settled and consistent case law (and most recently in its decisions 17/13 of 8 August 2017 and 18/12 of 11 July 2018), pedagogical assessment is a matter for teachers, whom neither the CEA nor the Board nor the parents either can supersede.

12. The designated judge-rapporteur can thus find no ground on which to annul the contested decision.
It follows from the above that there is no alternative but to dismiss this appeal on the ground that it is manifestly unfounded in law.