A

FRANCE

BASIC DATA
Official Country Name:	French Republic
Region:	Europe
Population:	59,329,691
Language(s):	French, Provencal, Breton, Alsatian, Corsican, Catalan, Basque, Flemish
Literacy Rate:	99%
Academic Year:	September-June
Number of Primary Schools:	41,000
Compulsory Schooling:	10 years
Public Expenditure on Education:	6.0%
Foreign Students in National Universities:	138,191
Libraries:	2,577
Educational Enrollment:	Primary: 4,004,704
	Secondary: 5,979,690
	Higher: 2,062,495
Educational Enrollment Rate:	Primary: 105%
	Secondary: 111%
	Higher: 51%
Teachers:	Primary: 211,192
	Secondary: 483,493
	Higher: 141,410
Student-Teacher Ratio:	Primary: 19:1
Female Enrollment Rate:	Primary: 104%
	Secondary: 111%
	Higher: 57%

HISTORY & BACKGROUND

The great cathedral schools of the eleventh century in Paris, Chartres, Laon, Orléans, and Tours first saw the light of day in France; over the twelfth century these schools would transform themselves into the prototype of the modern university. Universitas was the term used then to designate guilds (like that of butchers, vintners, and other trades) and came also to mean groupings of masters. From the eleventh through the fifteenth centuries, the Paris schools attracted teachers and students from all over Roman Catholic Europe.

Around 1050 the cathedral schools came into their own with a curriculum that focused on the language-based trivium (the liberal arts), identified as grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic (logic). Young pupils were taught to read, write, and speak in Latin, as well as selections from a corpus of pagan and Christian writers. They were shown how to imitate these models in order that they too might become models for posterity.

From today's standpoint, twelfth-century education in the cathedral schools and monasteries was as anarchic as it was exuberant and, all in all, foundational. The proliferation of schools and masters soon rendered it practically impossible for many local bishops to fully control and organize in a systematic way the schools and teachers present within their jurisdictions. The awarding of degrees, the career choices, and the life of most students were all rather chaotic. For the most part, students were destitute and obliged to find ways to keep alive. Their ways of doing so were often illegal.

As the century wore on a new system was introduced: a pupil who had completed his secondary education in the trivium was awarded the diploma of bachelor by the director of studies of his school; his qualification was based on his successfully passing an examination, usually oral in nature. The tripartite trivium led to advanced work in the four part quadrivium, the then called mathematical sciences composed of arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and harmony (music).

The student who mastered this curriculum and who successfully participated in exercises known as disputations, was judged worthy of being awarded a license to teach (licencia docendi). He became a "master of arts" and could be admitted to the ranks of those who lectured, wrote, and formed younger students within what would become in the thirteenth century the Faculty of Arts.

By no means did all successful students go on to ecclesiastical careers. A significant number of school trained clerics served noble lay patrons, often as part of the royal or other noble bureaucracy that was burgeoning in French-speaking territories throughout the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. Diplomacy, civil and legal administration, finances, and record-keeping, as well as written entertainment, all required well-schooled personnel.

If the eleventh and twelfth centuries sowed the seeds, they came to fruition principally in the thirteenth century with the founding of the university. In Medieval Latin universitas meant merely a corporation, usually of tradesmen, who exercised the same profession (shoemakers, barbers, etc.) or more or less what is understood today as a "guild." By definition and custom, the new university was international (its masters and students hailed from all over Christian Europe) and its purposes were to place human reason and intelligence at the service of the faith.

Since the ultimate ambition of Paris was to prepare for, undertake, and develop studies in theology, other more specialized university institutions were founded elsewhere in France. This was not done though in response to a centralized plan. A former center of literary study, Orléans, was chosen for the study of law; Montpellier dedicated itself to the study of medicine; and, as a result of the combat against the Cathar heresy, the University of Toulouse was founded as a kind of copy of Paris. Each of these institutions was granted a charter directly by the Pope.

For all intents and purposes, university governance was vested in its faculty (or faculties). In Paris, by mid-century, the chancellor had been forced to give up his former power. Power was transferred to a rector who, at the start, was merely the head of the Faculty of Arts and was elected as such by the professors of that faculty. He was aided by elected representatives (procurators) of each of the Four Nations into which students and masters were classified. Deans, or heads of the other faculties, were also directly elected by the masters. Considerable power was also enjoyed by a General Assembly of the faculties in which votes were taken not on an individual basis, but according to the seven "orders" constituting it. The interests of minorities were thus defended against the superior numbers of the more populous orders. Thus, the freedoms of individual teachers and groups of teachers were protected from outside interference as well as interference from the inside. Neither the bishop nor the king could force policies on the university as a whole or on parts of it; groups within the university could not force their views on other groups.

In this pragmatic manner a set of governing principles emerged that, by and large, still constitute the foundations of the institution known throughout the world as the university. International in scope from its very beginnings, the university was very much France's gift to education.

The day to day life of masters and students was hardly idyllic, at least not materially. Generally speaking, masters received no salary; they subsisted on what they could charge for administering examinations, although at times students gave them what they could. Only late in the century were there buildings designed for lecturing and giving examinations to students; before then masters rented out cheap halls that were usually miserably equipped. Costs for students varied greatly. The baccalaureate cost but a few pounds (under 100 gold francs or 20 gold dollars in pre-1913 money), while a doctorate in theology cost around 4,000 gold francs. Payment for taking examinations was calculated as follows: the basic living costs of a student (minus his rent and domestic servant) for one week were determined, and according to varying circumstances, the examination cost charged to him was several times the sum reached. Students varied in age from post-puberty to much older. The minimum age for taking the baccalaureate examinations in arts was 14, whereas 35 appears to have been the minimum age for a master of theology (who was required to spend some dozen years in specialized readings and courses). After receiving the licentiate in theology, the candidate was further required to sustain two lengthy argumentations before the entire faculty to which, along with all the bachelors of theology, all were invited to participate. It was only then that he could be officially received as a master.

The thirteenth century also saw the founding of many colleges within the university. A large number of these came into being through the initiative of individuals, often members of the royal family, churchmen, and provincial nobles desirous of establishing locales for study on behalf of students from their part of the kingdom. At the beginning, these colleges were essentially student residences; however, over time, masters were appointed to them.

The overwhelming majority of primary schools were run by the local parish priest who, in addition to the catechism, taught the bare rudiments of reading and writing. By no means were such schools freely open to all boys, let alone girls. Usually enrollments were open only to the sons of wealthy burghers and tradesmen and, from time to time, to especially gifted and motivated candidates for priesthood.

The peasant class in France remained largely illiterate until well into the nineteenth century. At times, a local convent or monastery sponsored a school; these were usually better equipped for serious primary/secondary learning than that of the poor parish priest. Girls were sometimes taught, though rarely, at nunneries, especially if they were of the aristocracy and/or seen as possibly having a religious vocation. Until the Revolution of 1789 the kings of France regularly sent their daughters to be educated at the feminine Abbey of Fontevrault in the Loire valley. It is consequently impossible to generalize about the state of primary education in medieval France; much depended on the circumstances of location and the conditions at given times. Thus, in 1324, the cathedral chapter at Chartres required every parish priest to maintain a school, but elsewhere, in poorer areas, such was not the case. During the bad times of the Black Death and Hundred Years War, primary education surely suffered as much as the universities did.

The disasters befalling France during the years 1340-1450 were reflected by a general decline of excellence in university education. The English and Burgundian wars of the period embroiled everyone, including the universities, in conflicts of interest and political turmoil. The university lost its marked international character as its leaders sought protection and support from new secular masters.

Indeed, the very organization of schools that came to be during the sixteenth century remains substantially the same as the kind of organization that still prevails in 2001: one building, housing pupils of different ages and consequently at different stages of preparation; the required breakdown of pupils into class years; six years of primary classes followed by another four to six years of more advanced preparation; and the whole leading to the pupil's earning a bachelor's diploma (more or less the equivalent of the modern French baccalauréat). Much pedagogical experimentation took place in these Renaissance schools, such as the elaboration of a direct method designed to teach the young pupils to speak Latin fluently. These innovations did not invariably meet with the unqualified approval of the traditional institutions of learning, particularly the Sorbonne and its Faculty of Theology, which remained faithful to "tried and true" disputation and dialectic. Consequently, the new breed of Humanists sought to create a brand new institution of higher learning, a kind of anti-Sorbonne that would be partial to their interests.

The Collège Royal was the first effort in France at putting into effect a truly "public," State-recognized educational institution. Administratively, the Collège Royal was highly innovative. No degree was required in order to lecture there. A generally recognized distinction was the sole criterion of a professor's suitability for election to one of its chairs. Nor were students selected on the basis of any prior preparation. Anyone could attend lectures there. No examinations were given, nor were diplomas awarded. Attendance required no payment of tuition since the college's professors received (theoretically at least) a salary paid from the State treasury. Academic freedom characterized the teaching that went on there. A professor could, and did, lecture on the Psalms without possessing a degree from the Sorbonne and with no Faculty of Theology oversight or control. This state of affairs infuriated the men of the Sorbonne who sought to close the college, but the king himself intervened and their suit was dismissed.

Little by little new disciplines and professors were added to the curriculum and the staff, such as mathematics, botany, astronomy, and Latin poetry. One professor, the influential Ramus, wrote a treatise demanding the systematic revision of the entire French system of education. Among the recommendations he made in his Avertissement was for a clearer distinction to be made between secondary and higher education (not achieved until the nineteenth century): secondary collèges would focus on grammar, rhetoric, and logic, while higher education would offer a more encyclopedic range of studies (including French grammar and literature). All education would be free and be paid for by the State. Indeed, the sixteenth century witnessed the rise of lay education. Schools founded and run by non-Churchmen proliferated as of this time. Many were paid for by local municipalities, as in the modern United States.

Generally speaking, however, despite individual successes here and there, the old universities underwent during the seventeenth century a process of decline whereas, especially during the second half of the century, the educational institutions founded and maintained by the Jesuit Order grew by leaps and bounds in size and influence. Their Paris college, the Collège de Clermont, became the Collège Royal in 1682 when it received the honor of being called Louis le Grand. The practicality of the Jesuits appealed to the bourgeoisie of the time who, as a class, were steadily gaining in wealth and power, just as the power of the potentially rebellious nobility was, as a matter of royal policy, declining. In many respects the Jesuits offered a kind of finishing school for the sons of the wealthy and socially conservative bourgeoisie. Teachings consisted of proper manners, geography and history, morality and religious formation, and proper and correct speech—in short, whatever it took to open up the world of affairs and officialdom to their clients. The education they offered, with its emphasis on good speaking and rhetoric, constituted an especially effective preparation for the Bar. What now is called the haute bourgeoisie in France is largely a seventeenth-century Jesuit creation.

Primary education was in far worse a situation. It remained totally under the control of the Church, local diocesan bishops, and parish priests. For the most part, teachers were miserably paid, especially in rural areas. They often doubled as assistants to the priest. Conditions varied a great deal from place to place. Reading and writing were taught, as was religion, but arithmetic was not always pursued. In some places an enterprising teacher would initiate his pupils in beginning Latin, but this was rare.

As the time of the great Revolution drew nearer, one notes a steady growth in the number of primary schools throughout the country: by 1776 the Haute-Marne region counted 473 schools in its 550 towns and villages; in 1750 the city of La Rochelle had about the same number of primary school pupils as it would in 1873. Yet, the diocese of Rieux counted a mere 41 schools for boys and 10 for girls out of 139 parishes. Illiteracy remained high. Though not entirely amenable to reliable interpretation, statistical studies have noted that on marriage acts about 47 percent of the men could sign their name while only 27 percent of the women could do so.

The consequences for public schooling in France were dreadful during the time separating 1914-1918 from 1939-1945, as can be imagined. Since the typical French infantry platoon was composed of about 40 men, mostly peasants, and a couple of non-commissioned officers, all led by a reservist second lieutenant who very frequently was a village or town school teacher (instituteur), the country's younger male teachers were almost wiped out as a class. Casualties among infantry lieutenants are generally the highest suffered by any Army rank.

The Revolution and the Napoleonic period that followed brought about massive change in the theory and practice of education. Despite some discontent with the inadequacies of public primary and secondary education, systematic reform of the ancien régime procedures was not at first a high Revolutionary priority. Increased funding was needed so that education might be offered to both rich and poor; the creation of a new centralized governmental agency was seen by some as needed to remedy inequities in educational opportunity throughout the nation. The old system remained in place until 1793. But with the passage of a bill in 1789 confiscating the property of ecclesiastic establishments and providing for their sale, decline set in due to lack of financial resources. Secondary education institutions had about 72,000 pupils in the country as a whole (with a population of approximately 20 million). The parish priest's approbation also remained necessary to the founding of a primary school.

At the end of the Second Empire, the university was in a lamentable state: the law and medicine faculties were bogged down in a repetitive kind of professional training, and arts and sciences had degenerated into a purely rhetorical lecture system. The Third Republic undertook important reforms. The university budget went from FF5,800,000 (__BODY__.1 million gold dollars) to FF16,350,000, making a vast building program possible. The administrative structure was redesigned in such a way as to accord each faculty, led by a dean selected by the Education Minister upon proposal of its faculty, a substantial degree of faculty-controlled autonomy. The government, meanwhile, was represented by a rector nominated by the Ministry. Scholarship funding was provided, as were laboratory facilities for scientists and medical faculties. Student enrollments went from 9,000 in 1870, to 24,000 in 1892, to 41,000 in 1913. The basic post-baccalauréat degree remained in letters and sciences, the licentiate (licence), followed by the diplôme d'études supérieures (a kind of M.A. research degree requiring the writing of a thesis-like mémoir) and the thesis-based doctorate (the doctorat d'université and/or, in conjunction with the State competitive examination named the aggregation, the very prestigious doctorat d'Éta necessary for a university full professorship). This basic structure prevailed until well after 1945 and, indeed, remains the reference point for the many adjustments and reforms initiated subsequently to that date up to the present time.

It must be said, however, that quite unlike the situation prevailing in Great Britain, Germany, and the United States, the French university system, like its primary and secondary schooling (and grandes écoles), inherited the virtues and defects of Paris-focused centralization. Unlike the U.S. Department of Education, the Ministry of National Education exercised, and still exercises, virtual day to day control over teacher and faculty appointments, budgetary allocations, and other areas of policy. The minister himself is a political appointee, but aiding him is a tenured bureaucracy of civil servants (fonctionnaires) whose role in implementing policy is very powerful. Tout passe par Paris (Everything has to go through Paris) is no idle saying. Until the 1960s the monolithic and huge University of Paris enjoyed a prestige matched in no respect by any other institution. Many faculty members in provincial universities continued, and continue, to reside in Paris. Most of the grandest grandes écoles are located in the Paris area. The immensely rich Bibliothèque Nationale de France, the nation's incomparable research library has traditionally drawn to its collections the major part of the country's bibliographic resources.

In imitation of what its leaders believed the Revolution of 1789 had stood for, the Third Republic, almost immediately after its establishment, attempted to design and implement a unified and nation-wide educational system including all levels and types of school—the primary, the secondary, and the higher (both university and grande école). The system would be essentially free of tuition costs, open to all pupils, and students would be judged exclusively on merit.

In reality, the Republic built on what the July Monarchy law of 1833 had come to pass, especially on the primary level. In 1872 there existed some 50,000 community primary schools in France of which somewhat less than a third were Church-run (12,000 for girls and 3,000 for boys). Over 4 million pupils were enrolled in these schools (out of a primary school population of some 5 million). However, the country's illiteracy rate stood at about 20 percent. There existed some 70 écoles normales ("normal schools") for the training of male teachers, but only 12 for females. Work conditions for female primary teachers were miserable. Their annual salary averaged as little as 340 to 400 gold francs ($70 to $80 per year). It was up to the State to correct these imbalances. As of 1879 a law required each département to fund and equip decently an école normale. Only two years later, all tuition fees were abolished by law, and, in 1882, primary school attendance become obligatory. Moreover, each school teacher, whether public or religious, was required to hold the Brevet de capacité (a government-approved teaching certificate). Finally, in 1886, yet another law was passed providing for the obligatory replacement of religious teaching personnel in the school by state-certified laymen and women.

By law in 1886 the principal task of the nonecclesiastical primary school teacher (instituteur/institutrice) was to inculcate Republican morale in his or her pupils by stressing the latters' duty toward the family, the school itself, the patrie, the personal dignity of persons, charitable one's fellow man and community, and animals. In addition, the six-year core curriculum also focused on reading and writing, elements of mathematics (addition, subtraction, division, multiplication, fractions and abstract reasoning), French history and geography, and drawing and music. The pedagogical methods used involved much pupil-teacher interaction and classroom discussion. Each class in all the schools was visited periodically by an official known as the Inspecteur de l'académie who made sure that the instructional programs centrally drawn up by the national ministry were properly carried out. Schools were democratic in the sense that pupils came from all social classes and represented all economic levels.

The general excellence of these public schools produced striking results. From 1885 to 1912 public primary instruction gained some 400,000 boys and 800,000 girls, while their confessional competitors lost about 1 million pupils. To these figures should be added the population of "maternal schools" (écoles maternelles), which were a kind of national preschooling scheme, and those who attended adult schools. By 1910 the French illiteracy rate had dropped to 4.2 percent.

Secondary education programs led to the national and standardized baccalaureate examinations, which, if successfully passed by the collégien or lycéen, gave him access to further study either at one of the universities or one of the many other higher educational facilities available. (A highly competitive entrance examination was generally required in addition to the baccalauréat for acceptance into one of the prestigious grandes écoles.) In short, the colleges and lycées of France were designed to identify what was socially regarded as the nation's pool of intellectually elite young men. This was seen by many critics as socially unjust, all the more so in that practically speaking the young men concerned were almost invariably drawn from the well-to-do bourgeoisie and traditionally intellectual classes represented by the liberal professions (doctors, lawyers, and teachers).

Girls and women offer an illustrative case in point. At about the same time as colleges like Bryn Mawr in the United States, and Girton in England, were being founded, several Third Republic politicians displayed enough far-sightedness to fight for women's educational opportunities in France. Already in 1880, Camille Sée sponsored a law widening these opportunities. However, as seen from today's perspective, the law was discriminatory in that it focused on teaching subjects "appropriate to women," which meant not exposing them to Latin or Greek, advanced mathematics, and so forth. But over the years various decrees of application concerning the law simply ignored these strictures, and, little by little, young women achieved parity with young men in their own lycées (only much later would these schools become coeducational in France.) A feminine École Normale Supérieure was founded in counterpart to each of the two major male schools and its pupils received the same education and training as their masculine coevals. However, the social and economic class to which these young women belonged was much the same as that of their male peers.

CONSTITUTIONAL & LEGAL FOUNDATIONS

Under the Constitution of the French Fifth Republic (1958), responsibility for nation-wide education lies with the government. That is with the office of the prime minister who in turn is responsible to the National Assembly and who forms a government composed of cabinet ministers, one of whom bears the title "Minister of National Education;" "Research and Technology" have spun off into ministries of their own. As it deems fit, the National Assembly passes laws relative to educational matters, and these laws are administered by the government which issues decrees of application. Thus, in July 1975, the Assembly passed a law known generally as the Loi Haby which established the present day system of single colleges (le collège unique), an institution occupying the intermediate space between the primary school and the more advanced secondary school known as the lycée. The aim of this law was to provide a secondary schooling context for all pupils of a given age cohort (roughly ages 11 to 12 to 14 to 15) so as to avoid both the social and the educational constraints of the former system's requirement that all pupils of that age group be irrevocably shunted as of age 11 or 12 into a specific educational directions. These choices have been set forward to a later date, when the pupil has completed the college curriculum, of about age 15 or 16. Over the quarter of a century or so since this reform was promulgated, various governments have introduced by decree a number of practices designed so as to make the reform work better. These decrees have ranged from major practical modifications to attempts at fine-tuning. No need has been felt to replace the Loi Haby by another comprehensive law, although it looks likely that such a major change lies soon in the offing.

It can be said that the considerable powers inherent in the national Ministry of Education of the Fifth Republic extend those enjoyed by the Ministry's counterparts under the Third and Fourth Republics (1944-1958). The Minister of Education and his delegates are in charge of all schooling in France, as well as in overseas territories and départements. He is assisted by a fair number of Secretaries of State and other political appointees, as well as by junior ministers and a huge bureaucracy. Although there do exist a substantial number of private and religious schools (primary, secondary, and university-level), they are very closely watched, indeed supervised, by the Ministry of Education as to programs of study and the qualifications of their teaching personnel.

Although the various regional, departmental, and municipal administrations in France contribute in various ways to defray local expenses relative to schools and universities, by far the majority of the educational budgetary burden is borne by the national Ministry. This includes teachers' and professors' salaries, administrative salaries and costs, equipment, and building and maintenance. Public education also constitutes the largest item by considerable measure of the French national budget.

EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM—OVERVIEW

Increased immigration, new emphases on innovative technology and popular consumerism, a desire of many for more democracy, the building of a new Europe (one of the truly significant French politico-economic ideas of post-war times), the eroding of erstwhile fixed class distinctions, the relative decline of agriculture with respect to manufacturing, services, and commerce, decolonization, international cooperation to a degree never before witnessed have all exerted tremendous influence on the French school and higher education systems.

Private Education: What in France is called enseignement libre (free teaching) corresponds to the British "public" school and to the American "private" school; however, private primary and secondary education in France is usually sectarian, indeed overwhelmingly Roman Catholic (95 percent). Though run and traditionally staffed by the religious teaching orders, these schools are increasingly staffed by lay people. As stated above, they are closely monitored by the state's Ministry of Education as to their teaching programs and the qualifications of their teaching staffs. Their pupils take the usual national state examinations (brevet and baccalauréat). They charge tuition and fees, although a growing number of them attempt to provide financial aid to the disadvantaged. Programs of study follow closely those mandated by the Ministry for the public schools, although it is fair to say that, in addition to required classes in religion, these Church-run institutions tend to emphasize the traditional pre-university baccalauréat curriculum, perhaps somewhat at the expense of technology and professional training more than their public counterparts. Their clientele is largely, but not as exclusively as many would have one believe, drawn from the middle classes and indeed from the upper crust of French society. Many, but not all, of these schools are now coeducational. Each school is run, often by a religious director, who exercises a great deal of discretionary power in his or her establishment. The director is frequently called upon to perform a kind of balancing act involving the directives issued by his or her Order, the local bishop, and the State. The school's traditions are held dear by both its clientele and by those who teach in it. Usually the pupils are asked to observe a dress code. The kind of school violence increasingly present in urban public schools is virtually unheard of in this setting. A good number of the schools have living and boarding facilities. School morale is generally high.

The good reputation and morale of the majority of private schools is due to the personal care lavished upon the pupils by the teachers and their institution. Some schools even specialize in boys and girls handicapped by learning and psychological difficulties, and their success rate is remarkably high. Discipline and order are maintained, but affection is also. Certain private institutions have received the Ministry's designation "ZEP" (Zone d'éducation prioritaire or "Educational Priority Zone"), qualifying them for extra financial help because they have shown signal success in coping with pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds. Finally, Catholic schools have a long tradition of involving parents and the family in the educational process. Until very recently this has not been true of public schools. The école républicaine has traditionally been understood as a State institution, not as a State service responsible to its clientele; in fact, the Revolutionary ideology from which it stems historically mistrusted parents and family. It consequently tended to uproot the child from his affective milieu of origin in order to turn him into a "citizen." Many parents find this aspect of enseignement libre to be quite attractive, as do, very often, their children.

Some of the richer and more famous of the Churchrun secondary schools are well equipped with modern amenities: computers, up-to-date laboratories, sports facilities, and even good libraries, although a good many are not so well favored. However, most succeed in promoting a good esprit de corps, and, given the class homogeneity prevailing in their student bodies, the pupils' degree of motivation, as well as smaller, more intimate classroom groupings, the scholastic results tend to be very good. The latest publication of the scores and percentages of candidates passing the national baccalauréat examination includes a large number of Roman Catholic colleges and lycées among the list of institutions with a passing rate of 90 percent or better.

Approximately one in six French primary and secondary school boys and girls attends a private (almost invariably religiously-affiliated) school, according to recent Ministry of Education statistics. Nevertheless, there remains a residue of anti-enseignement libre animus in certain French Republican circles. In 1984, when the then Socialist government was perceived as about to pass legislation severely damaging private Catholic schools, a huge mass demonstration involving thousands of people descended in protest on Paris. The government gave way and since then peace has prevailed. Slowly but surely the bitter quarrels of the 1880-1910 period are being laid to rest. Frenchmen who are rightly proud of the achievements of the public education system nevertheless do not, on the whole, wish to see the private sector abolished or even seriously tampered with.

Private school teachers number about 130,000 in France; by far most of these are lay people who take qualifying examinations virtually the same as their public school colleagues. Their pay scales are quite close to those enjoyed by public school faculty; however, since they are not tenured government functionaries (fonctionnaires titularisés), their retirement pay is much lower.

During the Fourth Republic, certain right-wing and centrist parties joined forces in order to vote State subventions to private schools; however, these were stopgap measures. In 1959, after the proclamation of the Fifth Republic, the Gaullist prime minister, Michel Debré, instituted a new régime of "permanent association" between public and private schools with the State financing much of the costs of the latter. The annual subvention today comes to 40 billion francs, approximately the sum required to pay teachers' salaries. The money goes to private schools willing to work "under contract" with the government. Few private schools have refused this contractual arrangement.

Very few graduates of the religiously-affiliated secondary schools choose to go on to Catholic institutions of higher education. The Catholic school system thus finds itself firmly embedded in the secular world.

Private Higher Education: The Ministry of National Education classifies private higher education into two types: les établissements privés d'enseignement libre (a code word for Roman Catholic universities); and private establishments of technical education. The "establishments of 'free' higher education" are regulated by the July 1875 Law on Higher Education; no linkage between them and the State are allowed. Nevertheless, these establishments may agree to conventions signed between them and individual State-run institutions with a view toward offering joint preparations for State diplomas.

Apart from seminary-type establishments, two major Catholic institutions of higher learning stand out. One is called the Institut catholique and is located in Paris; the other is the Université catholique de l'Ouest (Catholic University of the West) in Angers. Both offer full-fledged programs of study on the university level, and in the case of the Institut catholique, the following faculties are notable: the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies (which are essentially lacking in the State-run schools), the Faculty of Canon Law, the Faculty of Philosophy, the Faculty of Social and Economic Studies, the Faculty of Arts (Classics, French, History/Geography, and English-German-Spanish), preparatory classes for entrance into French Institutes of Political Studies, and the Faculty of Education (largely teacher-training). Close ties are maintained with a number of private technological and specialized schools, both Catholic-run and nondenominational. The Institut catholique enrolls some 12,000 full and part time students.

Private establishments of higher technological education are legion in France. Most are either engineering or business schools and must adhere to the national codes of technical education. They may benefit from State recognition and so award official state diplomas. Whether or not a private engineering school may award a State-type diploma is decided by the State Commission on Engineering Degrees.

PREPRIMARY & PRIMARY EDUCATION

Preprimary: During 2000-2001 over 6.5 million pupils were enrolled in the public preprimary and primary schools of France (about 2.5 million in the écoles maternelles and approximately 4.2 million in the écoles élémentaires). Previously organized by yearly "grades," present day primary programs fall into pluri-annual cycles: first apprenticeships (apprentissages premiers) cover the preprimary cycle; fundamental apprenticeships begin in the final year of preprimary and last over the first two years of primary; and deeper explorations (approfondissments) occupy the final three years of primary school.

Briefly summarized, the areas dealt with in the école maternelle (cycle I) include: Living Together; Speaking and Building Up Your Own Language (an initiation into the study of French); Acting in the World (interacting physically and imaginatively with objects; other people-games; and sports); Discovering the World (natural and human spaces; materials like wood, metals, etc.; hygiene; and the environment); Imagining, Feeling, and Creating (singing; drawing and painting; dance; theater; some writing; recognition of forms; and counting).

Primary (Cycle II): The goals to be achieved by the time this cycle is completed are as follows (in relation to the subjects dealt with):

• French: The pupils have learned to speak in public, to listen to others, to tell and invent stories; to read both out loud and silently; and to write in clearly formed characters.
• Mathematics: The pupils have mastered the numbers from 1 to 1000 and understand decimal numerals; they know how to compare numbers; they are in a position to practice addition, multiplication, and subtraction and can reckon mentally; they are able to resolve simple problems using these resources; they can recognize a few geometric shapes (circle, square, rectangle, etc.) and can reproduce them; they both know and can use common units of measure (meter and centimeter; gram and kilogram; and liter, hectoliter and milliliter).
• Discovering the World (History, Geography, Sciences, and Technology): The pupils know their way around more or less proximate spaces and historical periods, and begin to put the latter into chronological order as they learn also to use maps, the globe, and certain major elements of the universe; they have some precise knowledge of how their bodies work, of rules of hygiene, and of animal and vegetable life; and they have learned to use simple technical tools, such as a camera.
• Civics: Basing themselves on their classroom experience, the pupils have learned fundamental rules of social interaction: respect for self and others and rules for living in common with others; they know that France is a republic; and are familiar with several of its symbols.
• The Creative Arts: The pupils interpret simple songs and do drawings, paintings, collages, and sculptures with various techniques and materials; they undergo some basic initiation to theater, dance, and imaging.
• Physical Education and Sports: The pupils develop their motor skills and learn to run, jump, throw, and swim better; learn to respect game rules; and learn team ship.

Primary (Cycle III): This final cycle explores more deeply the above-mentioned subjects and activities, taking into account the strengths and weaknesses of the class members. When required, special counseling and help will be made available to individual students. Every effort will be made in order to see to it that each pupil advances regularly alongside his or her classmates.

Some daily foreign language instruction will be introduced during this cycle. The time given over to this activity will rarely go beyond a quarter of an hour; video and audio cassettes will be made available to teachers that want them. Goals of this level are:

• French: The pupils learn to recite from memory a poetic text; they are capable of reading a 10-page piece of prose without excessive fatigue; they learn to correctly take down a dictated text of about 10 lines; and they are able to compose a short text respecting spelling and grammatical rules.
• Mathematics: The pupils can perform decimal calculations; they are familiar with the usual geometric shapes; they have mastered the four arithmetical operations and can calculate in their heads; they know how to use such tools as the ruler, the square, and the compass; and they can solve problems using the above operations and measuring instruments.
• History and Geography: The pupils are able to identify the major prehistorical and historical periods of French history; they know a number of important dates; and they can locate on a map the following elements of French geography: major rivers, mountain ranges, various regions, the basic French administrative units, and large cities.
• Science and Technology: The pupils have learned how to simply analyze the relationship between living beings and their habitat; they can perform simple experiments; and they understand the concept of assembly, such as how to set up an electric circuit.
• Civics: The pupils prove themselves capable of respecting the rules governing their school and of understanding each individual's responsibility with respect to society at large; and they can describe the political institutions of France, such as universal suffrage and the workings of the National Assembly.
• The Creative Arts (Music and the Plastic Arts): The pupils are capable of observing, listening, producing, and inventing in ways that develop their creative imagination and form their sense of culture by relating and comparing works drawn from different periods and styles; and they further develop their abilities with respect to theater, dance, and imaging.
• Physical Education and Sports: The pupils become increasingly aware of the rhythms of living beings; and through the practice of sports they acquire greater ease and try to attain a certain performance level in the activities, which they practice.
• Foreign Language: Initiation into foreign language study will continue as the pupils go on to middle school-level work.

The first year of college or the beginning of intermediate schooling, la sixième, will consist largely of consolidating what the primary school has taught the pupil with a view toward his acquiring new notions and developing more sophisticated intellectual tools and work methods.

SECONDARY EDUCATION

Founded by the Loi Haby of 1975, the collège unique is designed to follow through on the primary school principal of housing all pupils, whatever their talents and tastes, together under one roof. Specialization into university preparation, pre-professional, and technical training is thus put off until the pupil attains the age of 15 or 16. (Formerly, this specialization occurred when the pupil entered the class known as sixième, that is when he was 11 or 12 and it was largely based on an entrance examination now regarded as socially discriminatory.) Thus, the four years spent at the collège are essentially transitional and given over to orientation. The collège is structured largely in order to "fit" the pupil into one of the many orientations open to him at the lycée level. Consequently, in certain respects the collège is "intermediate," and in other respects it is part of the secondary school cycle. It is characterized by flexible scheduling, the availability of many new programs, and by the careful monitoring of all pupils. Those who display difficulties in adjustment and in class work are provided with counseling and help. Serious attempts are made also to involve parents in the functioning of the school.

The goals and ideals of the new collège unique, which in many respects resembles the American Middle School (or Junior High), have not always been successful in practice. The four years of the French collège unique break down into three main periods: (1) the initial year called sixième; (2) the two years of cinquième and quatrième; and (3) the final year called troisième.

The sixième is designed to solidify what was learned in primary school; to introduce boys and girls to new subject-matters; and to help them develop good work habits and methods. Pupils have 23 or 24 hours of class weekly, undergo two hours of "directed study" aimed at all pupils, and have what is called an arrangement for "consolidation" aimed at pupils who encounter difficulties.

Not surprisingly, the curriculum of the sixième follows closely upon that of the final year of elementary school, yet it differs also in that it emphasizes practice and creativity on the part of the pupil. For example, in French, after reading carefully and discussing a given text, the pupils might be asked to rewrite part of it, retelling an episode from the perspective of a character other than the protagonist. Or they might be assigned to write a letter to a foreign pen-pal describing life in their school. After returning the corrected papers to the class, the teacher will focus on their grammatical and spelling errors to the entire group, ask the schoolchildren to rewrite their work, and have the other pupils correct them.

In mathematics the focus is on geometry, numeric works, and functions. Pupils describe and trace simple plane figures, and they measure, compare, and calculate areas and perimeters. They also deepen their knowledge of the four arithmetical operations by applying them to whole numbers and decimals, and they are introduced to relative numbers. During the later part of the course, they work with handling data and dealing with functions. Tables, diagrams, and graphics are studied and related to other disciplines, such as geography and technology.

History and geography are a combined focus. History deals mainly with the ancient world: the beginnings of agriculture, Egypt, the Hebrews, Greece, Rome, and early Christianity. Facts are learned, but pupils are also taught to examine critically the documents from historical knowledge: treatises, maps, photos, etc. Geography examines the relationship between mankind and his diverse habitats—the diversity of terrains, climates, urban and rural settings, and population densities.

Civics, now incorporated into the history-geography section, deals principally with the pupils and their fellow peers in the college itself. The establishment's structure is examined, as are the people who make it run (the student body, the faculty, the principal, and the social worker). Also, the principles of rights and obligations are closely studied, as is the text of The Declaration of the Rights of Man.

Life and Earth Sciences capitalize on the young adolescents' fascination with nature and its manipulation, as well as on their love of experimentation. In this class they study the classification of plants and animals, the cell, animal and vegetable reproduction, and the food chain. They also examine various types of tissue under the microscope, graft plant cuttings, and dissect a flower.

Technological study examines how objects are produced, manufactured, and placed for sale by different kinds of enterprise. Each pupil works on a specific project and is taught computer technology word-processing, searching, and how to use the Internet in order better to do so.

Physical education and sports focus on the latter during the sixième: pupils are introduced to gymnastics, swimming, combative and racket sports, and team sports. Motor capacities are developed, and special attention is given to a sense of effort and responsibility.

The plastic arts emphasize creativity in two and three dimensions and use various techniques and materials (clay, paper, collages, paint, and ink). Meetings are arranged with local artists and field trips are taken to museums.

In music, special attention is given over to the "education of the ear." Six major compositions from various periods and genres are listened to and studied. In addition, six vocal works are sung by groups of pupils, and they are also initiated into playing instruments of percussion and the recorder. Some attention is paid to electronically generated music.

Thus, the above describes how the sixième builds on the advanced primary school program. Its major curricular innovation lies in the pupil's serious undertaking of study of a modern foreign language. Most colleges offer English, Spanish, German and Italian, although some also provide for Portuguese, Russian, Arabic, Chinese, and the local regional language. Latin is offered in cinquième where a full quarter of collegians opt for it; it has the reputation of being the place where the "better pupils" are. The first year of foreign language study is largely "cultural." Pupils are introduced to how people relate to each other in Britain and the U.S. and how they express their tastes and dislikes. Some effort is made to have the young French boys and girls speak the language with a suitable pronunciation and a vocabulary that stresses the individual (size, clothing, and age) and his or her activities (games, holidays, and travels), as well as family relations. Some historical and geographical information concerning the country, or countries, in which the language is spoken are given.

The cinquième and quatrième years constitute the focal point of the four collège unique years. Essentially the program of study follows through on the subjects taught in sixième (including a modern foreign language—a second of which must be added as part of the quatrième), but the sciences are broken down into Earth and Life Sciences and Physics and Chemistry. It is here that many children, especially those from recent immigrant and disadvantaged families, find their studies to be fairly difficult. This is especially the case in mathematics and the sciences. Numerous pupils require remedial help. By and large the program does not differ radically from the older, traditional collège and lycée curricula that led to the "classical" baccalauréat and from there to the university. Moreover, in addition to the weekly 23 or 24 hours spent in the classroom, the pupils find themselves with homework assignments amounting to between 20 and 30 hours a week. Work in all the curricular subjects takes place on an ever higher level of abstraction (for which not all pupils are yet quite ready), and, of course, the work requires well-organized and critical consultation of manuals, dictionaries, and other reference works. Frustration and a sense of failure consequently affect many collegians at this level, particularly among males it seems. Of course, without the establishment of the collège unique a quarter-century ago, many of its present pupil clients would simply not be in a college at all, and this, of course, has no doubt prompted many conservative critics to question the validity of its establishment.

The subject-matter covered in the two-year course curriculum includes French, mathematics, foreign languages, history and geography, civics, life and earth sciences, physics and chemistry, and technology. More advanced classes in the plastic arts and music, as well as in physical education and sports, continue throughout these two years.

The troisième is the terminal middle-secondary school year constituting arguably the single most important school experience in the lives of French schoolchildren. It comprises three elements: the continuation and "perfection" of the studies undertaken so far; an endeavor to all the studies accomplished to date; and a way to determine the orientation to be followed by each individual pupil in his or her three year subsequent lycée level higher secondary schoolwork. Furthermore, at the close of troisième, or each pupil takes his first national examination: the Brevet d'études. This diploma is awarded, or not awarded, on the basis of each child's course grades in all classes taken during quatrième and troisième (these grades are counted with a coefficient of 1), as well as in combination with a timed written examination in French, Mathematics, and History-Geography (with a coefficient of 2). The brevet and access to the lycée is awarded to pupils attaining a global average of 10 through 20 (it should be added that grades exceeding 17 are very rare). The success rate for the brevet usually hovers around 75 percent. Enrollments in the state-run colleges in recent years have averaged about 3 million pupils.

Upper Secondary Education: Three main, and quite different, specialized options are open to brevet holders at the lycée level: the General Baccalaureate (baccalauréat general), which leads to the university, and to specialized schools of higher education (e.g., the grandes écoles, with their highly competitive entrance examinations); two types of Technological Baccalaureate (baccalauréat technologique), which opens to various specialized schools of a technological, professional or artistic sort; and the Professional Baccalaureate (baccalauréat professionnel), leading directly to insertion into the job market and on the job training (this last program involves two years of study, the previous two comprise three). Of these three options, the General Baccalaureate is the simplest; it also comes closest to the older, more traditional lycée; the Technological Baccalaureate structurally resembles the first. The "professional" curriculum is much more complex in that all its options (including a Baccalaureate-less path) recognize many diverse goals and levels. It is highly recommended that each pupil make as solidly based a decision as possible concerning his or her eventual path, and that both parents and school counseling staff be closely involved in this process which, it is urged, should begin no later than the year of the cinquième.

The Technology option, as well as the Professional curriculum, can lead to a Technological (or Professional) brevet, as well as, in the first case, a baccalauréat and, in the second, a Certificat d'aptitude professionnel, (Certificate of Professional Aptitude or CAP). Those youth who choose either the brevet or the CAP path usually go directly on to a job, with or without a formal program of on the job training. The lycée programs attempt to provide a basis for as many types of jobs as there exist in the country's job market; some programs combine school programs with apprentice-type internships in various firms. In the case of those who successfully pass the Technological baccalauréat, many specialized institutions, both public and private, are available.

Lycée enrollments have totaled on average over the past five years of about 1 million; slightly more than half of enrolled students have chosen the Professional option. The various apprenticeship programs attract an average of 350,000 students each year, while the special secondary level programs (e.g., agriculture, health services) enroll about 250,000 boys and girls. Thus, most collegians go on to some lycée level work; however, the programmatic unity imposed on pre-brevet pupils is followed up by an extreme diversity in the lycée.

Grosso modo, the French secondary educational system, seems both to promote and to respond to a division apparently built into French society. One large segment of its clientele uses the secondary school to prepare for advanced higher educational training and therefore postpones its insertion into the productive economic life of the country. An equally large segment either drops out of the educational system as such altogether or uses it as an immediate springboard to a wage-earning career. It is very much an either/or situation. Unlike the United States and Canada, France has no community college-type alternative, nor does it possess a truly varied gamut of institutions of higher learning. Also, theoretically at least, the state-recognized masters degree delivered by a remote provincial university or "university institute" in no way differs from the one earned at an older, established provincial institution or, for that matter, at the Université de Paris IV (Sorbonne).

HIGHER EDUCATION

The needs of a new, modernized post-industrial economy required an overhaul of higher education. Scholarship aid (bourses) was vastly increased, making it possible for larger numbers of less well-to-do young men and women to attend universities. The advent of the post-war Welfare State had important repercussions on university structures.

Reform of higher education, consequently, became a matter of urgency, and the 1970s saw its beginnings; this reform has become on-going. In fact, it appears more and more likely that reform will remain a permanent feature of French higher education for many years to come.

Universities: The Ministry of Education lists 91 institutions in its repertory of universities (including "technological" universities, certain "institutes," and other entities) located in France and its overseas territories and départments; this is well over four times as many universities as existed in 1960. Whereas before the 1960s, Paris had 1 university, albeit broken up into various faculties (e.g., Letters, Sciences, Medicine, Law), it now boasts 14, none of which groups all faculties or branches of learning under a single administration. Expansion has been truly exponential.

Even in 2001, a large and fairly old provincial university will usually possess a library much smaller in size than that of a good American liberal arts college whose student body is less than 2,000, although in recent times research undertaken by university faculty has been more strongly encouraged. The Centre National de Recherche Scientifique (National Center for Scientific Research), founded after World War II, has had global responsibility for research and publication in all academic disciplines, sponsoring both "laboratories" of its own and the research of individual faculty members at the universities and grandes écoles, and subsidizing "centers of technical competence" involving one or more institutions. However, the movement away from the university as a purely teaching establishment has been, and remains (though less and less) a very slow one.

Each university is headed by a president responsible to the rector of the Academy in which it is located; academies often contain two or more universities. The university president is supported by vice-presidents and academic deans that correspond to the diverse disciplines. Faculty recruitment on the maître de conferences (assistant/associate professor) and professeur levels is lengthy and complex.

Cities in which two or more universities are located will usually witness a grouping of kindred disciplines at each of the institutions. This does little to foment interdisciplinary intellectual contact and cooperation.

Although each discipline introduces variations into its own teaching program, this is done in reference to a nation-wide model that corresponds to three cycles. The student spends his or her first year (cycle) preparing a diploma suitable to his field of major interest, the Diplôme d'études universsitaires générales or DEUG; this is followed by his or her registration in a second cycle, i.e., two or three year licence preparation immediately leading to study at the maîtrise (masters) level. At this point most students leave the university for the job market. Those who stay on, who tend to be the most highly qualified, will undertake the third cycle, which is the preparation of a research project leading to a kind of thesis, or mémoir, called the Diplôme d'études approfondies (DEA). The best of these students will be encouraged to pursue a doctoral degree. Once the doctorate is obtained, the student may sign up for an examination proving his or her capacity to do a high level research project and to supervise individual, as well as teams, of young researchers (l'habilitation à diriger des recherches). At any time after the maîtrise a student may choose to sit for one of the various competitive examinations, such as the Certificat d'aprtitude à l'enseignement secondaire, for a lycée teacher's certificate, the aggregation, or still other examinations. The success rate in these examinations is not encouraging: it averages about 14 percent for the CAPES and aggregation, though CAPES examinations have a higher rate of success than agrégatifs; the rate also depends on the discipline.

Alongside the DEA doctoral program there exists a one-year professional program, involving an obligatory internship within an enterprise or business called the Diplôme d'études supérieures spécialisées (DESS). Upon its completion the student leaves the university for a job.

One and two year university-level programs in technology are offered by the various Instituts universitaires de technologie attached to universities. These institutes offer a two-year diplôme universitaire de technologie (DUT) which leads directly to the job market. Access to the institute is selective. A cycle 1 one-year technological program is also available; it leads to the diplôme d'études universitaires scientifiques et techniques or DEUST, the technological equivalent of the DEUG.

Some lycées also offer very specialized and goal-directed brevets de technicien supérieur (BTS); some 85 fields are covered. About 220,000 students are enrolled in these lycée based programs.

The following ministerial list of average diploma awards (rounded off) over the past five years will provide an idea of the attrition rate among students at the various steps of their university careers: DEUG or the terminal DEUST - 132,000; licence - 133,500; maîtrise - 86,000; DESS - 24,500; DEA- 24,250; and doctorate - 10,000. These figures are to be compared to the total enrollment of students in the French university system: 1 million out of a total of some 2 million post-baccalauréat students altogether. The dropout rate appears to be quite high.

Tuition and fees are set each year by the Ministry of Education; these are very low by North American standards. Financial aid in the form of scholarships is made available on the basis of family need at all levels of university study. Scholarly criteria are used for third-cycle university work. Students are eligible for subsidized housing, provided there is dormitory space, and for inexpensive student restaurant meals.

Entrance to the university is non-selective. The only requirement is the baccalauréat or its equivalent, except in the case of medicine and certain other health-related fields. Students registered in these fields are also subject to individual review at the close of their first year of study.

State-sponsored post-baccalauréat schooling outside of the universities may be subdivided into three main types: public engineering schools, the grandes écoles, and health service/social work-related institutions. In addition, one must also count the system of lycée-based preparatory classes, which are two-year programs designed to prepare students for the grandes écoles and engineering school competitive entrance examinations.

Whereas the great majority of the grandes écoles are administered by the Ministry of National Education, several depend on other ministries or administrations. Thus, the very prestigious École Nationale d'Administration, founded in 1945 in order to prepare upper-level civil servants.

Foreign Students: The Ministry of National Education and many cooperating universities and other institutions of higher learning (including certain grandes écoles) have established a variety of programs aimed at foreign students. The majority of these involve the French language (beginning, intermediate, and advanced) and diverse subjects (literature, art, and history) grouped together as "culture." Certificates and diplomas are awarded appropriately. There has been, and continues to be, considerable demand for these programs. A fair number of summer programs of the above type are also offered, some in collaboration with American colleges and universities, as are year or semester long collaborative programs that involve a variety of French institutions.

ADMINISTRATION, FINANCE, & EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH

The French Republic is headed by a popularly elected president who represents and serves the Nation and State. He is responsible for the country's territorial integrity and appoints the governing prime minister (following the political majority controlling the legislative National Assembly). In turn, the prime minister appoints his cabinet, who are the ministers responsible for governing the country, among whom one of the most important is the Minister of National Education. This Minister's official title is Minister of National Education, Research, and Technology. It is he who proposes policies, enjoys budgetary oversight, and directs numerous sub-ministerial political appointees (as well as myriad civil servants) subject only to the prime minister.

Constitutionally, the Minister operates within the parameters of certain fundamental laws, such as the 1875 laws governing education and Church and State. He also has the task of proposing new laws as the situation may require them. He is assisted by a large bureaucracy and permanent advisory committees whose decisions he normally accepts.

Each of the three main components of the system—primary, secondary, and higher education—has, under the Minister, its own area of competence and organizational traditions. In addition, the division of France into geographic areas known as "academies" provides input into decision-making from the diverse regions of the country.

A kind of executive chain-of-command descends from the Minister through a number of echelons down to the director of a primary school. Although each director, principal, proviseur (or lycée director), dean, university president, and academy rector heads his own bailiwick, his area of responsibility is fully integrated into a system of responsibilities headed by the Minister.

According to the latest figures publicly available (1998), the total costs of education (public and private) come globally to about FF607.3 billion (92.6 billion euros) of which FF343.3 (52.5 billion euros) are spent by the Ministry of National Education. The global figure represented 7.2 percent of the 1998 French gross national product. The difference between the global cost figure and the costs paid by the Ministry can be accounted for as follows: FF48.4 billion (7.4 billion euros) from other state ministries; FF124.3 billion (18.9 billion euros) regional, local, and territorial contributions; FF35 billion (5.3 billion euros) from business-operated training programs; FF13.5 billion (2.1 billion euros) other national administrations; and FF41.8 billion (6.4 billion euros) from family contributions. An additional FF25.1 billion (4.1 billion euros) were paid out to overseas territories and départments. The grand total was thus: FF634.4 billion (92.6 billion euros) at 1998 exchange rates. Of these sums 77.7 percent went for personnel salaries, benefits and pensions; 14.8 percent to upkeep and physical plant; and 7.5 percent to investment in future capital needs.

Further breakdowns show (in 2000-2001) a total of 528,000 persons employed in the écoles maternelles and elementary schools. Teaching staff in these schools amounted to 358,000 persons and cost per pupil amounted to FF24,700 (3,765 euros). In secondary education some 786,000 were employed, of which 508,000 were teachers; cost per pupil came to an average of FF25,000 (8300 euros). In post-baccalauréat classes the cost was FF68,900 (10,504 euros).

The Ministry of National Education provides financial aid to schoolchildren (both collège and lycée level) from families of demonstrably modest means; such aid can total as much as FF5000 per annum.

In recent years enrollments in higher education have been approximately 2 million students with a public sector teaching corps of about 75,500 professors. Yearly costs per student have ranged very widely depending on the diverse programs in which students are enrolled. Thus, the average university student in the humanities and social sciences costs approximately FF40,000 (6000 euros), whereas an engineering student costs about FF78,000 (12,000 euros).

TEACHING PROFESSION

Pedagogical research is rather scattered in France. There are no schools of education as such, although pedagogy is treated as a research subject in various institutions like the ÉNS de Cachan; the Institut catholique maintains a Faculty of Education for the training, largely, of Catholic school teachers. Courses in "professional formation" are offered at many universities for future teachers, as well as at the écoles normales that train primary school teachers. C.N.R.S.-sponsored "research laboratories" in such subjects as educational psychology and counseling do exist, as do various offices of pedagogical services within the Ministry of National Education itself. Teaching methodologies, as in foreign language-teaching methods or the laboratory sciences, are variously studied and evaluated. Matters pertaining to proposed institutional restructuring are entrusted to the expertise of specially appointed commissions and boards of research before changes are introduced and implemented.

A final word must be said concerning the role of professional societies and teachers' unions (syndicates) within the general educational picture in France. Membership in unions is usually determined according to the members' various professional levels (primary, secondary, and higher education) and interests, as well as their political affiliations and tastes (left-wing, right-wing, and centrist). There are also a number of students' unions similarly affiliated. All of these unions are legally recognized as such, and they enjoy the right to strike, although their rôle in collective bargaining is not easily determined. In addition, university and research faculty, as well as some secondary school teachers, are members of the many various disciplinary professional associations. From time to time they speak out publically on matters pertaining to their discipline and, more often than not, what they say is taken seriously.

SUMMARY

The American example in business study, technology, and perhaps even in the pure sciences has provided a counter to native French institutions. In fact, some of the newer of these institutions directly copy and Gallicize American models, both physically and programmatically. Much of what has been genuinely innovative in post-war France has not been generated from within the native French system, except for such institutions as the ÉNA and Sciences Po, which were designed specifically to serve the ends of the French State. This raises the serious question as to whether, as presently constituted, the State is in fact capable of engendering educational innovation in such a way as to foment original intellectual, scientific, and artistic creativity.

There are four problem areas that appear at present to require urgent thinking and planning. The first of these and perhaps the most symptomatic of the four concerns the status, ideology, and purpose of the collège unique. Most Frenchmen agree that in its present form it simply does not work; it fails even in its intended purpose to further democratize the secondary school system. Apparently, the present Minister of Education thinks that the solution to the collège unique's difficulties lies in rendering it more flexible, financially independent, autonomous, and less rigidly programmatic. Furthermore, the Minister promises that, along with this flexibility, his office will provide a firm piloting of the institution and the numerous establishments constituting it: "la souplesse avec la norme" (flexibility within the norm). The norm, presumably, will involve a greater integration with the primary level (the college will become more authentically a "middle school"); entrance evaluations to the sixième will emphasize French and Mathematics less than at present; and curricula will be "more imaginative." A number of national evaluations will take place over the four year course of studies; these will culminate in a national examination awarding a Brevet d'études fondamentales. These evaluations and brevet will also constitute part of the norm and promised ministerial piloting.

The second and third major concerns have to do with foreign languages and foreign study/educational travel. The two are closely related. The first of these involves the entire educational system, and it also is designed to counteract the overwhelming choice of English as the major foreign language studied. It seems likely that the study of two modern foreign languages will soon be required of all secondary level schoolchildren. All university level students will be required to pass a competency test in at least one foreign language in order to graduate. The university requirement will go beyond the level of mere colloquy; it will involve the ability to function linguistically in the student's area of academic specialization. Thus, a French university student should be linguistically equipped to read work in his or her field written in an appropriate modern foreign language, as well as to follow lectures in his or her subject in that language. These new requirements constitute, along with much increased foreign travel and study on both the secondary and higher education levels, part of the "Europeanization" of French education, rendering the French system more like that of many of the smaller European countries. The policy, although not designed with these implications in mind, may eventually have some repercussions on the nature of the French State-controlled educational system.

The last concern relates to the above quoted statement of Sylvain Auroux, director of the ÉNS-LHS. It is namely the urgency and importance of a new and informed humanistic reflection in the first century of the new millennium. Advances in science and technology, a commercially and monetarily driven world, and the lack of attention paid by the élites in the developed countries of the world have made such reflection indispensable. Given the largely materialist and careerist agendas of present day interest groups, however, the bright and the beautiful do not seem to have the time to give over to such reflection. Auroux appears to believe that France is blessed with educational establishments like the one he directs that are particularly well placed to form the highly articulate thinkers needed.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Buisson, Ferdinand. Dictionnaire de Pédagogie. Paris: 1882.

Chervel, Antoine. L'Enseignement du Français à l'école Primaire. Paris: INRP, 1995.

Georgel, Jacques. L'Enseignement Privé en France. Paris: Dalloz, 1995.

The French Ministry of National Education, 2001. Available from http://www.education.gouv.fr.

Glatigny, Michel. Histoire de l'enseignement en France. Que sais-je? Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1949.

Le Monde, 2001. Available from http://lemonde.fr/education.

Office national d'information sur les enseignements et les professions. Ministère de l'Éducation nationale, de la Recherche et de la Technologie. Onisep: de la ème au bac, September 2000.

—Karl D. Uitti