Reseau Edufrance

A fascinating mix of age-old traditions and modern vibrancy, France is also a place with exciting educational options.

TO SAY that food is a passion in France will be stating the obvious. Escargots, wines and the famed Brie and Roquefort cheeses are just a few of the items on offer to tantalise the taste buds. Cafes are as ubiquitous as litter is not and with the number of Michelin star restaurants spread across the country, one is assured of gastronomic indulgence.

And Paris has the distinction of being one of the world’s fashion capitals and is the base for big names such as Yves Saint Laurent, Hermes, Givenchy and Dior.

Haute cuisine and couture aside, France also has a long tradition in scholarship, giving the world thinkers like Jean Jacques Rousseau and Jean-Paul Sartre. Moreover, French used to be the language of European high society, commonly used in the royal courts up to the 19th century.

It should therefore come as no surprise that France is among today’s global leaders in education.

With an estimated 265,000 foreign students, it is only behind the United States and Britain in international student figures and offers a considerable breadth of programmes.

The Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, immortalised by Victor Hugo’s famous novel, is one of the significant landmarks in France.

The system in France

The French university curriculum system sees students obtaining a Licence, the equivalent of a basic degree in three years, a Master in another two years and a Doctorat after a total of eight years of study.

France has a total of 3,000-plus institutions of higher learning that include 240 engineering schools and 230 business schools. Around 2,000 of the total are devoted to the niche fields of art, fashion, design and architecture.

There are also 87 public universities, ranging from the venerable Sorbonne in Paris, which dates back to 1179, to the high-tech Nice-Sophia-Antipolis, founded in 1965.

Research is an integral feature in the university system, covering the entire range of academic disciplines and involving more than 300 doctoral programmes and over 1,200 research centres and laboratories.

French doctoral programmes have always held international appeal and the number of foreign doctoral candidates have been on the rise, going up by 7.5% between 1999 and 2004.

Also, there are uniquely French institutions known as the grandes écoles (specialised schools of higher education). Created in the early 19th century, the elite grandes écoles are extremely selective and offer education of a very high standard.

The provincial town of Colmar, like many others around France, turns into a spectacle of decorative lights every Christmas.

Unlike the public universities, which are obliged to accept all candidates who hold a Baccalaureate, grandes écoles consider applicants solely on the results of competitive oral and written exams.

There are 226 grandes écoles in France and students who sit for the admission tests often undergo preparatory school, often for two years.

“Normally, 90 to 95% of grandes écoles students come from preparatory schools while the remainder come from various instituts universitaires de technologie (IUT), known in English as university institutes of technology,” says Universiti Teknologi Petronas lecturer-cum-researcher Dr Mohamad Naufal Mohamad Saad, who studied in France from 1995 to 2005.

Dr Mohd Naufal studied first at IUT de Colmar and later at Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Ingénieurs de Limoges (National Higher School of Engineers of Limoges).

“Chances of being accepted through the IUT route are slim and I was very fortunate to be accepted,” he admits.

Specialising in a single subject area, mainly in the humanities, business and engineering, grandes écoles are moderate in size with student populations of 2,000 to 3,000.

All students in France’s public institutions, both foreign and local alike, are beneficiaries of a generous amount of government aid that sees them paying a mere €160 (RM780) to €500 (RM2,440) per year for tuition when the actual fees are an estimated €6,000 (RM29,240) to €15,000 (RM73,100).

Cost of living in France is around €800 (RM3,890) to €1,000 (RM4,870) per month, going up to some €1,200 (RM5,840) in Paris.

This makes France one of the least expensive countries in Europe for international students, who enjoy other benefits such as low-cost dining facilities, student housing, and discounts on transportation and cultural events.

A farm in the East of France, where agricultural studies is also becoming increasingly popular.

However, bear in mind that the private grandes écoles charge a high tuition that can cost €4,000 (RM19,500) to €10,000 (RM48,730) and beyond.

Apart from business and engineering courses, France is also noted for social science programmes that expose students to the different schools of thought.

A notable institution is the Sciences Po in Paris that is a partner of the Global Public Policy Network together with Columbia University in the United States, the London School of Economics and Political Science and the National University of Singapore.

Agricultural studies are also becoming increasingly popular and France also has some 2,000 schools devoted to the niche fields of art, fashion, design and architecture.

Another interesting feature of French education is the presence of its many “competitiveness clusters”, a system that sees different regions specialising in various fields of study.

“Each province has its own distinctive academic specialisation,” says Malaysia-France University Centre project coordinator Simon Cordonnier.

“For example, Burgundy specialises in nuclear industries, Brittany in marine biology due to its coastal proximity, Toulouse in aeronautical engineering as the Airbus headquarters and main factory are there, and the Agropolis in Montpellier in agricultural studies.”

It can be tough

There are, says Cordonnier, currently about 500 Malaysian students in France, with some 300 sponsored by the Public Service Department and other government agencies.

Given France’s reputation in engineering, most of the Malaysians there are furthering their studies in this field.

Being thousands of miles away from home in a foreign land can be daunting and Malaysians – and Asians in general – often have quite a lot of adapting to do, both academically and culturally.

“French education stresses a lot on application,” continues Cordonnier. “Taking maths as an example, the way to get to the result is more important than the result itself.”

While many universities in France reflect classical architecture, others like the Toulouse Business School at Christian Rivière are modern and futuristic in design.

The French emphasis on application, an unfamiliar approach for many Asian students, is aimed at moulding graduates who think critically at both the theoretical and practical levels.

There is also the question of studying in a language that is quite foreign to most Malaysians.

According to Cordonnier, Malaysian students often need to undergo one year of intensive French classes to reach a proficiency level acceptable at university.

“Language is still an obstacle. Efforts are being made to address this and there are some programmes in English at French institutions as well,” he says.

Demands of the classroom aside, there are also the countless stories of how unfriendly your average Frenchman can be to those who do not speak his lingo.

Dr Mohamad Naufal, however, has a different take on this, citing a rather comical episode from those days when he was still a greenhorn in the language,

“I was behind an Asian couple who were asking a Metro personnel some questions in English but he answered them in French. Although my French was not good at the time, I managed to form a question and to my surprise and the couple’s annoyance, the Frenchman answered me in fluent English,” he recalls.

“The French people are not unfriendly, but they are definitely proud of their language and appreciate it if you make an effort.”

By: theStar.com