Education in France

The French educational system is highly centralized, organized, and ramified. It is divided into three stages:
primary education (enseignement primaire);
secondary education (enseignement secondaire);
tertiary or college education (enseignement superieur)

Primary and secondary education is predominantly public (private schools also exist, in particular a strong nationwide network of primary and secondary Catholic education), while tertiary education has both public and private elements.

History

While the French trace the development of their educational system to Charlemagne, the modern era of French education begins at the end of the nineteenth century. Jules Ferry, a lawyer holding the office of Minister of Public Instruction in the 1880s, is widely credited for creating the modern Republican school (l’ecole republicaine) by requiring all children under the age of 15 — boys and girls — to attend. He also made public instruction free of charge and secular (laïc).

Organisation

All educational programs in France are regulated by the Ministry of National Education (officially called Ministere de l’education nationale, de l’enseignement superieur et de la recherche). The head of the ministry is the Minister of National Education, one of the highest-ranking officials in the cabinet. As of August 2005, the Minister is Gilles de Robien.

The teachers in public primary and secondary schools are all state civil servants, making the ministere the largest employer in the country. Professors and researchers in France’s universities are also employed by the state.

At the primary and secondary levels, the curricula is the same for all French students in a given grade, in public and semi-public (or subsidized) institutions. However, there exist specialized sections and a variety of options that students can choose. The reference for all French educators is the Bulletin officiel de l’education nationale, de l’enseignement superieur et de la recherche (B.O.) which lists all current programs and teaching directives. It is amended many times every year.

Find B.O. archives on the Ministry’s official website

Academie system

The French territory is divided into 35 academies, 26 of which are located in mainland France and 9 in French overseas territories. One academie often spans a few departements, the most commonly used administrative unit in France. Academies also cover French schools located abroad so that the Lycee Français Charles de Gaulle in London, for example, falls under the jurisdiction of the Lille academie.

The academie headquarters (termed rectorat) is usually located in the largest city in the concerned territory. It is headed by a recteur. The main responsibility of the academie is to manage personnel and state budgets pertaining to the education system. It serves as a link between regional specificities and the centralized governing body in Paris. It ensures the implementation of the official educational programs produced by the Ministry.

At one level down in the national education hierarchy, each departement also has its own inspection academique, headed by an inspecteur d’academie.

Note that the academie, as an education-based territorial unit, has no relation with l’Academie française, the authoritative body concerning the French language.

School calendar

In the Metropolitan territory, the school year extends from early-September to early-July. Most students have finished their year by Bastille Day, 14 July. The school calendar is standardized throughout the country, and is the sole domain of the ministry.

For the 2005-2006 school year, the first day of classes across the country is 2 September. The year ends on 4 July.

In French overseas departments and territories, the school calendar is set by the local recteur.

Major holiday breaks are as follows:
All Saints (la Toussaint), one and a half weeks around the end of October and the beginning of November;
Christmas (Noel), two weeks around Christmas Day and New Year’s Day;
winter (hiver), two weeks starting in mid-February;
spring (printemps), two weeks starting in mid-April;
summer (ete), two months starting in early-July.

All Saints, Christmas and summer vacations occur simultaneously across the country. For the winter and spring breaks, the country is divided into three zones (A, B, and C) and each zone’s vacation dates are shifted by one or two weeks to prevent families from crowding up in popular destinations such as ski and seashore resorts.

Primary education

Schooling in France is mandatory as of age 6, the first year of primary school. Many parents start sending their children earlier though, around age 3 as kindergarten classes (maternelle) are usually affiliated to a borough’s primary school. Some even start earlier at age 2 in pre-maternelle classes, which are essentially daycare centres. The last year of maternelle, grande section is an important step in the educational process as it is the year in which pupils are introduced to reading.

After kindergarten, the young students move on to primary school. It is in the first year (cours preparatoire) that they will learn to write and perfect their reading skills. Much akin to other educational systems, French primary school students usually have a single teacher (or perhaps two) who instructs in many different disciplines, such as French, mathematics, natural sciences, history and geography to name a few (the latter two are seldom separated). Note that the French word for a teacher at the primary school level is instituteur, or its feminine form institutrice.

Religious instruction is not supplied by public schools. Laïcite (a term referring to the separation of church and state) is one of the main precepts of the French republic. Pupils therefore have civics courses to teach them about la Republique, its function, its organization, and its famous motto Liberte, egalite, fraternite (Freedom, equality, brotherhood).

In a March 2004 ruling, the French government banned all “conspicuous religious symbols” from schools and other public institutions with the intent of preventing proselitization and to foster a sense of tolerance among ethnic groups. The law was not welcomed by all though, and some religious and libertarian groups showed their opposition saying the law hindered the freedom of religion, as protected by the French constitution.

Secondary education
French secondary education is divided into two schools:
the college (somewhat comparable to U.S. junior high school) for the first four years directly following primary school;
the lycee (comparable to a U.S. high school) for the next three years.

The completion of secondary studies leads to the baccalaureat.

Baccalaureat

The baccalaureat (also known as bac) is the end-of-lycee diploma students sit for in order to enter university, a classe preparatoire, or professional life. The term baccalaureat refers to the diploma and the examinations themselves. It is comparable to British A-Levels, American SATs, the Irish Leaving Certificate and German Abitur.

Most students sit for the baccalaureat general which is divided into 3 streams of study, called series. The serie scientifique (S) is concerned with the natural sciences, the serie economique et sociale (ES) with economics and social sciences, and the serie litteraire (L) focuses on French and foreign languages and philosophy.

There is also the baccalaureat technologique and baccalaureat professionel.

Peculiarities

A striking trait of higher education in France, compared to other countries such as the United States, is the small size and multiplicity of establishments, each specialized in a more or less broad spectrum of disciplines. A middle-sized French city, such as Grenoble or Nancy, may have 2 or 3 universities (for instance: science / humanities), and also a number of engineering and other specialized higher education establishments. For instance, in Paris and suburbs, there are 13 universities, most of which are specialized on one area or the other, and a large number of smaller institutions.

It is not uncommon for graduate teaching programs (masters degrees, the course part of PhD programs etc.) to be operated in common by several institutions, allowing the institutions to present a large variety of courses.

In engineering schools such as Ecole polytechnique, it is not uncommon that a large share of the teaching staff is not made up of permanent professors, but of part-time professors hired to do teaching only. These part-time professors are generally hired from neighbouring universities, research institutes, or industry.

Another originality of the French higher education system is that a large share of the scientific research is not done by universities, but by research establishments such as CNRS or INSERM. In many cases, the research units of those establishments are installed inside universities (or other higher education establishments), and jointly operated by the research establishment and the university. It is also fairly common that research staff teach some graduate classes, for instance. However, this research staff will not be counted as part of the normal academic staff of the university.

These traits can cause international university rankings to underestimate French universities due to the criteria used.

Another characteristic is the low tuition costs. Since higher education is paid by the French taxpayers, the prices are very low: as of 2005, 160 euros (one hundred sixty) per year for undergrads, 200 euros (two hundred) per year for graduate students and 300 euros (three hundred) for Phd students… So theoretically, one can get a Masters degree (in 5 years) for about US$1,000. However the price for tuition in an engineering school can reach 600 (six hundred) euros a year.

Health insurance for students is about the same price as the tuition, so only the living costs and books expenses have to be added. This can explain the very low rate of people under 25 years old who are on the job market in France.

Grandes ecoles & classes preparatoires (CPGE)

The Grandes ecoles of France are higher education establishments outside the mainstream framework of the public universities. They are generally focused on a single subject area, such as engineering, have a moderate size, and are often quite selective in their admission of students. They are widely regarded as prestigious, and traditionally have produced most of France’s scientifists and executives.

The classes preparatoires aux grandes ecoles (CPGE) is a high school prep course with the main goal of training students for enrollment in a Grande Ecole (and especially an engineering school, see : Grandes ecoles). Admission to the CPGE is very competitive and is usually based on performance during the last two years of high school, called Premiere and Terminale. Each CPGE receives the files of hundreds of applicants worldwide every year during April and May, and selects its new students under its own criteria (mostly excellency). A few CPGE programs, mainly the private CPGEs (which account for 10% of CPGEs), also have an interview process or look at a student’s involvement in the community, although the latter has much less importance than in the United States. Of course, each student must have passed successfully his Baccalaureat (or equivalent) in June to be admitted in CPGE. CPGE programs have a nominal duration of two years, but the second year is sometimes repeated once, mostly in the scientific sections, where the student gets then the status of Cinq Demi, for he was only a Trois Demi during his first second year (explanation : A ‘Three Half’ integrates/enrolls in X (Polytechnique) between the 1st and 2nd year because the integral of x from 1 to 2 is 3/2. Same idea for cinq demi, since the integral of x from 2 to 3 is 5/2).

The most known CPGEs are certainly the scientific ones, which can only be accessed by scientific Bacheliers (the Baccalaureat S being known as the most prestigious and selective one). Scientific CPGE are called either MP (”Mathematics and Physics”) or PC (”Physics and Chemistry”), etc. First year CPGE students are called the ‘Math Sups’ (Sup for “Superieures”, Upper in French), and second years ‘Math spes’ (Spes standing for “Speciales”, special in French). Both the first and second year programs include as much as sixteen hours of mathematics teaching per week, ten hours of physics, two hours of philosophy, two to four hours of (one or two) foreign languages teaching and two to three hours of minor options: either S2I: Engineering Industrial Science or Theoretical Computer Science (including some programmation using the Pascal or CaML programming languages, as a practical work).

There are also CPGE which are focused on economics (known as epiciers, who prepare the admission in business schools) and humanities. These latter are known as hypokhagnes (first year students) and khagnes (second year students).

The students of CPGE are also matriculated in universities, and can rejoin college in case of failiure of their grandes ecoles ambitions or if they just do not wish to become engineers and feel not able to pass the Ecoles Normales Superieures competitive examinations. The ratio of students who failed to enter grandes ecoles is low in the scientifics and economics CPGE, but high in humanities, for the only Grandes Ecoles aimed in these classes are the Ecoles Normales Superieures.

The amount of work required of the students is exceptionally high. In addition to class time, students spend several hours each week completing exams and ‘colles’ (very often written ‘kholles’ to look like a greek word, this way of writing being initially a khagneux joke -cf. supra, khagne). The so called ‘colles’ are unique to French academic education in CPGEs. They consist of oral examinations twice a week. The student spends one hour facing a professor alone in a room and has to answer as many questions correctly as possible, while the teacher regularly increases the difficulty of the questions to make ensure that the student is tested vigorously. ‘Colles’ are regarded as extremely stressful, particularly due to the high standards expected by the teachers, and the subsequent harshness that may be directed at students who do not perform adequately.