Maisonneuve

2015. Eleven students at Montreal’s Collège de Maisonneuve are arrested as they prepare to leave for Syria, where they plan to become Islamic State fighters. The shocking development affects everyone and exacerbates tensions already present at the school, where more than half the students are Muslims of Arab descent. Maisonneuve looks into the repercussions of this significant event and at the important questions it continues to raise. We meet Kaëlla, Rayene, Idir, Stéphanie and Samuel, young adults trying to find their way in a highly strained environment, where mistrust of the “other” is the norm. “We kind of became the lab rats of radicalization,” Rayene says.

Filmed over several years, this six-episode series takes us into the culturally pluralistic Collège de Maisonneuve, as the school picks up the pieces after the trauma of 2015. The series offers unprecedented access to the daily lives of students with different backgrounds and opinions. Each of the protagonists offers smart and nuanced views on their lives in their late teens, revealing a maturity that reflects their own journeys. We see how their thinking evolves, and how their reflections become marked by a real openness to others.

Maisonneuve looks at the dialogue that begins among the various groups. “Giving young people permission to say what they think, to say they don’t agree, is a good thing in a modern society that wants to grow and that considers itself open and democratic,” says Momo, a school social worker. By allowing them to express themselves and creating safe spaces for dialogue, the College fosters debate in order to deconstruct persistent myths and reduce tensions among members of the student body. With its humanistic approach, Maisonneuve highlights both the importance and the fragility of living together in harmony in Quebec.