Les Grandes Ecoles

This page is about the french educational system, not just the grandes écoles, which are only a small part of it.

Principles

Jules Ferry's laws

The principle of the modern educational system were defined by Jules Ferry in 1880-1882. The educational system must be public, laïc, gratuit et obligatoire (public, secular, free and mandatory). He passed laws to create public elementary schools in every town. Before that, education was mostly in the hands of private (religious) institutions. With Ferry's laws, every kid can access to the same basic education. Professors of elementary schools (called instituteurs, nicknammed les hussards noirs de la république) played a crucial role in the cultural unification of the country and in the disparition of many regional languages.

Those laws are still the core of the french educational system. Education is mandatory until the age of 16. Concerning the other principles, they still hold in public schools. Every child can receive a good education, and that cost almost nothing to their parents. So is there some room for private schools ? Yes, about 20% of the kids go to private schools, mostly because of religious concerns.

Laïcité and the public/private school war

This was, and still is, a very sensible issue in France. If you think that war is too strong, keep in mind that this issue caused some of the biggest demonstrations in France's history, some politicians and even a few governments had to resign because of it. In fact, at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, the catholic church was reluctant to the french republic, so the creation of a secular public school was a direct attack against to influence of the church. Some priests called the public school l'école du diable (the devil's school).

Laïcité means that the state and all public institutions must be neutral regarding the religious beliefs. Civil servants are not allowed to show any religious symbol, and no religious education can be provided in public schools. Recently, a law was passed so that children are also not allowed to display any religious symbol. Therefore, if you want that your kid receive some religious education, you must send him/her to a private school. Most private schools have a contract with the french state. They agree to teach the same things than public schools, and they can add some religious course. In exchange, the state pays the teachers.

Grades

The french educational system may be complex, but the grades are very simple. At every level, from elementary schools to university, the grades range from 0 (the worst) to 20 (the best). This grading system is even standard outside the education system and many newspapers and critics give grades in the same range about everything.

You must get at least 10 to pass. For the diploma, you get a special mention if your grade is greater than:

• 16: très bien (very good)
• 14: bien (good)
• 12: assez bien (quite good)
• 10: passable (pass)

The grades also determine if you advance to the next class or if you have to do another year at the same level.

Education system before the baccalauréat

La maternelle (kindergarten)

This one starts very soon, since you can go there from 2 years old to 5-6 years old. This school is not strictly mandatory, but almost all kids go there when they are 4 years or older. The school is generally divided into three section, the petite section (2-3 yars old), moyenne section (3-4 years old) and grande section (5-6 years old).

La primaire (elementary school)

Kids go to this school from 6 years old, and it is 5 years long. The name of the classes are: CP (cours préparatoire), CE1, CE2 (cours élémentaire 1 and 2) CM1 and CM2 (cours moyen 1 and 2). The main goal of elementary school is to learn how to write and read, and how to count. The secondary goals are to learn some basic notions of sciences, arts and foreign languages. This is the last school where there is onl one teacher per class. After that, there will be one teacher per course (french, maths, english, history/geography, ...).

Le collège (junior high school)

While in America, college refers to some university level, in France, it refers to junior high school. It is 4 years long, and children normally start collège when they are 11 years old. The 4 classes are called sixième(6th) cinquième (5th), quatrième(4th) and troisième(3rd). Yes, in this order: it is a countdown to the baccalauréat. Children who have some propblems with school may finish collège at the age of 16 or more, when education is no longer mandatory. Therefore, the collège is the last school attended by everyone. At the end, children have their first diplom, the brevet des collèges. It is fairly easy to get, and it is worth almost nothing, but it may be the only diplom some people get.

Le lycée (high school)

Unlike previous schools, that were the same for everyone, there are three kinds of lycées:

• lycée général: the general one. In theory, it is for children who want to study a long time in the university. It is three years long, and it ends with the baccalauréat of type L, S or ES.
• lycée technique: the technical one. In theory, it is for children who want to study a short time in the university. It is three years long, and it ends with the baccalauréat of other types.
• lycée professionnel: the professional one. In theory, it is for children who do not want to go to the university and want to work immediatly. It ends a CAP (1 year of study) or BEP (2 years) specialized in a profession. People may also study 2 more years to get a bac pro.

In theory, you can choose what lycée you will go to. In practice, it is a selection. The student with the best grades go to the general one, the ones with average grades go to the technical one and the ones wih the worse grades go to the professional one.

Le bac

People almost always say le bac to denote the baccalauréat (it is an abreviation). This diplom is very important to the french culture. Since you usually get is at 18, the age of legal majority, the bac is considered as a Rite of Passage.

The bac is an institution by itself: every year, newspapers publish the results and there are long discussions about it in the media. People over 30 usually says that this diplom was hard when they pass it, but is worth nothing today since everybody get it easily. The subjects of the philosophy tests are announced on TV news (after the tests, of course). Since everybody in France have the same subjects, teachers put a lot of efforts to preserve secrecy, everyone start the test at the exact same time and there is a spare subject if there is a leak about the main subject.

There is first a serie of written tests; if you get more than 10, you get your diplom. If you have less than 8, you fail and you have to stay another year in terminale. If you have between 8 and 10, you can pass some oral test to get a better grade. If you don't have an average of 10 or more even with those better grades, you fail.

Higher education

There are universities in France, like in all other countries. The oldest one is the university of Paris, called la Sorbonne. But there is another higher education system, called les grandes écoles, that exists only in France. The grandes écoles are similar to colleges/graduate schools, but very selective.

La Sorbonne

The university of Paris was founded mid 12th century and is thus one of the oldest in the world. It was nicknamed la Sorbonne, which was technically the main college of the university. The building still exists but the university of paris was split to create 13 smaller universities in 1970, only 3 of them kept the word Sorbonne in their name. The historical place of the university, in the 5th arrondissement of Paris, is still famous for the universities and grandes écoles that are there.

Since the university is inside the capital of France, its sudents took part in mainy protests and revolutions that happenned in Paris. The last major one occurred in may 1968, and those protests, as well as the massive strike that happened at the same time, threatenned the power of president de Gaulle, who resigned a few months after the protests.

Other universities

There are about 80 universities in France. In the big cities, the universities that existed before 1970 were split. That is why the name of french universities are something like université de Bordeaux 1, université de Bordeaux 2 and université de Bordeaux 3.

There is no real selection to enter an university, and the tuition fees are extremely low. Consequently, the universities are often overcrowed and poor. There is a high failure rate during the first years, so the class are overcrowed only during the licence, equivalent to a bachelor (3 years). After the licence, the next two years are the master diplom. Some people continue during 3 years or more to get a doctorat (PHD).

Grandes écoles

The grandes écoles (lit. great schools) are colleges or grad schools that requires to pass a competitive exam before entering the school. Students prepare this exam during 2 or 3 years. This preparation is done in special classes of lycées, called CPGE - classes préparatoire aux grandes écoles. So the students of the grandes écoles may never go to the university but receive a master degree after 3 years in one of those grandes écoles. Only about 10% of the students attend to one of these special schools, but this small minority includes a large majority of political leaders, corporate executives and renowned scientists.

The most famous grandes écoles are:

• école normale supérieure (ENS) is a school for future teacher and scientists. Most french nobel price and Fields medal winners attended to this school. Alumni are called normaliens.
• école polytechnique (nicknamed l'X) is an engineering school with a strong military tradition. Alumni are called polytechniciens.
• sciences po, officially institut d'études politique (IEP) is a school attended by future journalists and politicians. There are several IEP, the most famous is in Paris.
• écoles des hautes études commerciales (HEC) is a business scool.
• école nationale d'administration (ENA) forms high level civil servants and politicians. Contrary to the other ones, students attend this school after a master degree they got in another grande école. Alumni are called énarques.

In fiction

• Marcel Pagnol wrote some books about his childhood and his time at school. His father was an instituteur of the third republic, and the book describe well what was the french elementary school at that time.
• Entre les murs is a movie about a teacher in a collège near Paris.
• Être et avoir is a film/documentary about an old instituteur in a remote area.
• Tanguy is a normalien who does not want to finish his doctorat. His dad is a polytechnicien.
• Nicolas Bourbaki is a Nom De Plume of several french mathematicians (alumni of the ENS). It started as a prank of the students, but it ended with a serie of books that changed the way mathematics are taught.