François Dufour (Play Bac)

Francois Dufour (Play Bac) is the editor-in-chief and cofounder of Mon Quotidien, first daily for kids launched in France on 5 January 1995.^[1] He is also editor-in-chief of prize-winning Le Petit Quotidien and L’Actu both created in 1998.
This three dailies have around 150,000 subscribers in France, whereof 20,000 are classes. They are the only existing dailies for kids in Europe, even in the Western world. They come out six days a week, but not on Sundays, only by subscription and are meant for kids between 7 and 17 and their parents.

They also have an extra weekly supplement in English: My Weekly.

He is also editor-in-chief for L’Actu-Éco, a business weekly to help youngsters understand the basics of economy through the everyday news.

Biography

Born in 1961, graduated from Sciences Po (Paris), he invents the game Play Bac together with two friends, Jérôme Saltet and Gaëtan Burrus, in a train between Paris and le Touquet, the 19th of October, 1985. Then the publishing house Éditions Play Bac in order to publish it. They are also the creators of the curriculum-based games Les Incollables sold throughout the world in more than 50 million copies, known in the USA as Brain Quest (licensed to Workman Publishing). Years after passing his French Baccalaureate in 1979, François Dufour tried to do the same without any preparation in 2006, did poorly but succeeded. This experience is detailed in a book Comment ne pas rater son bac (publisher: Librio, 2006).

François Dufour is a board member of the World Association of Newspapers, representing the French national newspapers. In 2008, he became one of the copresidents of the États Généraux de la Presse Écrite, an industry reunion to try to save the French written press, under the initiative of French president Sarkozy. Francois Dufour is the author of an essay critical to his pairs: Les journalistes français sont-ils si mauvais ? (publisher: Larousse, 2009).

A fine connaisseur of the USA, he is an Eisenhower Fellow (1998) and A Young Leader of the French-American Foundation (2005).

François Dufour is a jury member of the Prix Clara, a literary award for young writers of short stories, of the Best Young Journalist Prize (L’Actu/RTL), of the Best School Newspaper (Mon Quotidien/Le Sénat).

Since 2008, he became an executive member of the CODICE (linked to the French Ministry of Finance), which mission is to boost the economic culture of the French population, especially the young. Play Bac Presse received in 2009 the Prix Dauphine-IPJ for its "simple way of explaining economy".

Being a huge admirer of Nelson Mandela, he cotranslated his biography written by Bill Keller, editor-in-chief of The New York Times. The book was published in France in 2010 - by L’Actu/La Table Ronde - to celebrate the 20 years liberation of the "last hero of the 20th century."

References

1. ^ Tagliabue, John (27 July 2010). "PARIS JOURNAL; Daily Paper for Children Defies the Craze for Digital". The New York Times: p. 6. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/27/world/europe/27paris.html?pagewanted=all. Retrieved 24 August 2010. 

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Name	Dufour, Francois
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