École Polytechnique

École Polytechnique
Logo École Polytechnique.png
Motto: Pour la Patrie, les Sciences et la Gloire
Motto in English: For Homeland, Sciences and Glory
Established: 1794
Type: Military college
General: Xavier Michel
Students: 2,000
Undergraduates: none (undergraduate degree in a military or civilian preparatory college is a prerequisite)
Postgraduates: French traditional equivalent of a Master's Degree, Masters, Ph.D
Location: Paris, France
Sports: mandatory, 6 hours per week
Colours: Red, Yellow
Nickname: X
Website: Official English website
For other Écoles Polytechniques, see École Polytechnique de Montréal and École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
For the French Polytech' network (Ecoles Polytechniques des Universités), see for example École polytechnique de l'université de Nantes

The École Polytechnique (the “Polytechnic School”), often referred to by the nickname X, is the foremost French grande école of engineering (according to French and international rankings). Founded in 1794 and initially located in the Latin Quarter in central Paris, it was moved to Palaiseau in 1976. It is one of the oldest and most prestigious engineering schools in the world, with a very selective entrance exam.

Its motto is Pour la Patrie, les Sciences et la Gloire (“For Homeland, Sciences and Glory”).[1] Traditionally, a favoured goal of the polytechniciens is to join the elite government bodies known as the grands corps techniques de l'État (X-Mines, X-Ponts, X-Telecom,...) ; nowadays the majority of the 500 students who graduate each year join Ph.D. or masters programmes in French or foreign universities. The school is one of the founding members of ParisTech.

As one of the world's foremost establishment in science, The École polytechnique trains graduates who become outstanding scientists, researchers, managers.

Ecole Polytechnique ranks among the best universities of the world. Professional Ranking of World Universities 2007 placed it among Top 3 Universities of the world.

Contents

Status

Polytechnique flag guard on Bastille Day 2008.

The École polytechnique is a higher education establishment run under the supervision of the French ministry of Defence (administratively speaking, it is a national public establishment of an administrative character). Though no longer a military academy, it is headed by a general, and employs military personnel in executive, administrative and sport training positions. Both male and female French polytechniciens (or “X”), as the engineering students of the school are known, are reserve officer trainees and have to go through a period of military training before engineering studies proper.[2]

However, the military aspects of the school have lessened with time, with fewer and fewer students joining officer careers after leaving the school, and the reduced duration of preliminary military training. On great occasions, such as the military parade on the Champs-Élysées on Bastille Day, the polytechniciens wear the 19th-century-style “grand uniform”, with the famous bicorne, or cocked hat (students usually don't wear any uniform during courses since the suppression of the “internal uniform” in the mid-1980s).

Activities

The École polytechnique has an undergraduate/graduate general engineering teaching curriculum as well as a graduate school. It has many research laboratories operating in various scientific fields (physics, mathematics, computer science, economics, chemistry, etc.), most operated in association with national scientific institutions such as CNRS, CEA, or also INRIA. In addition to the faculty coming from these local laboratories, it employs many researchers and professors from other institutions, including other CNRS, INRIA and CEA laboratories as well as the École Normale Supérieure and nearby universities such as the École Supérieure d'Électricité (Supélec) or the Université Paris-Sud, creating a varied and high-level teaching environment.[3]

The Polytechnicien studies

Introduction

“ The mission of the Ecole Polytechnique is to train students capable of devising and achieving complex and innovative projects at the highest level possible, thanks to a strong pluriscientific culture. Our mission is also to train young men and women in leadership skills so that they can become tomorrow's outstanding scientists, researchers, managers and public officials.[4] ”

The Polytechnicien program is quite different from typical university or college studies. Studies at Polytechnique cover a scope that goes from advanced undergraduate studies (students are awarded a Master after the third year of their studies at Polytechnique) to Graduate studies;[5] students usually go on to pursue a second Master's degree following the Polytechnicien program and most often achieve it in less time than students coming from regular undergraduate programs.

Additionally, the breadth of the program is larger than what most university students go through, often including topics beyond one's specialty. This focus on breadth rather than depth has been hotly debated over the years, but it nevertheless forms a characteristic of the Polytechnicien program. It is particularly useful for cross fertilization purposes between different fields, as graduates from Polytechnique most often have abilities in several disciplines; for example, they must follow at least six different topics during their second year. Humanities and sports are also mandatory parts of the curriculum, adding to the differences with most university programs.

Admission

The admission to École polytechnique in polytechnicien cycle is made through a very selective entrance examination, and requires at least two years of preparation after high school in Classes Préparatoires. Admission includes a week of written examinations, during Spring, followed by oral examinations which are handled in batches (séries) spanning over Summer.[6]

About 400 French students are admitted each year. Foreign students, having followed a classe préparatoire curriculum (generally, French residents or students from former French colonies in Africa) can also enter through the same competitive exam (they are known as “EV1”). Foreign students can also apply through a “second track” (“EV2”) following undergraduate studies. In total, there are about 100 foreign students each year, most of them coming from Morocco, Tunisia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, China, Vietnam, Iran, Romania and Russia but some also from Québec and United States. Finally, some foreign students come for a single year from institutions such as MIT and IST.

Curriculum

The total length of the undergraduate curriculum was historically 3 years: one year of military service, one year of “common trunk”, then one year of specialized studies (“majors”). This was somewhat changed in the X2000 reform, whereby a fourth year of studies was introduced.

The curriculum begins with 8 months during which French students undergo civilian or military service. In the past, military service lasted 12 months and was compulsory for all French students; the suppression of the draft in France made this requirement of Polytechnique somewhat anachronistic, and the service was recast as a period of “human and military formation”. All the French students spend one month together in Barcelonette in a center for mountaineering warfare. By the end of this month, they are assigned either to a civilian service or to the Army, Navy, Air Force or Gendarmerie. Students who are assigned to a military service complete a two-month military training in French officer schools such as Saint-Cyr or École Navale. Finally, they are spread out over a wide range of units for a five month long assignment to a French military unit (which can include, but is not limited to, infantry and artillery regiments, naval ships and air bases).[7]

Francophone foreign students do a civilian service. Civilian service can for instance consist of being an assistant in a high school in a disadvantaged French suburb.

The cadets of Polytechnique rushed to the defence of Paris against the foreign armies in 1814. A statue set in the honour courtyard of the school commemorates this deed. A copy was installed in West Point.

Then the “common trunk” of instruction begins. Traditionally this was a very standardized year, in which all students had to take all courses in a fixed set, spanning all disciplines. Following the X2000 reform, the common trunk now begins at the end of the shortened military or civilian service, and some latitude of choice is provided for the following year. The set of disciplines spans most areas of science (mathematics, applied mathematics, mechanics, computing science, biology, physics, chemistry, economics) and some areas in the humanities (foreign languages, general humanities...). Students also must choose a sport which they will practice 6 hours every week.

While French students stay under military status during their studies at Polytechnique, and participate in a variety of ceremonies and other military events, for example national ceremonies, such as those of Bastille Day or anniversaries of the armistices of the World Wars, they do not undergo military training per se after having completed their service in the first year.[7] They receive at the end of the first year the full dress uniform, which comprises black trousers with a red strip (a skirt for females), a coat with brass buttons and a belt, a small sword and a cocked hat (officially called a bicorne).

In the third year, students have to choose an in-depth program (programme d'approfondissement), and must do a research internship. The fourth year is the beginning of more specialized, professional studies: students not entering a Corps de l'Etat must join either a Master's program, a doctorate program, another ParisTech college or institute such as the École des Mines de Paris or ENSAE, or a specialization institute such as Supaéro in Toulouse. The reason for this is that the generic education given at Polytechnique is more focused on developing thinking skills than preparing for the transition to an actual engineering occupation, which requires further technical education.

Ranking

The École Polytechnique is ranked among the most prestigious engineering schools of the world, for instance by the “World Universities Ranking” of The Times Higher Education Supplement. In all rankings published by French newspapers, the École Polytechnique almost always secures first place, and according to salary surveys its graduates receive the highest pay among all French graduates.[8][9]

Grades of the “common trunk” of the curriculum are used to rank the students. Traditionally, this exit ranking of the school had a very high importance, and some peculiarities of the organizations of studies and grading can be traced to the need for a fair playing ground between students.

For French nationals, the ranking is actually part of a government recruitment program: a certain number of seats in civil or military Corps, including elite civil servant Corps such as the Corps des Mines, are open to the student body each year. At some point during their course of study, students specify a list of Corps that they would like to enter in order of preference, and they are enrolled into the highest one according to their ranking.

Since the X2000 reform, the importance of the ranking has lessened. Except for the Corps curricula, universities and schools where the Polytechniciens complete their educations now base their acceptance decisions on transcripts of all grades.

Tuition and financial obligations

For French nationals, tuition is free as long as the full curriculum is completed, and a salary is received throughout the school years at the level of a reserve officer in training. French students, through the student board (Caisse des élèves or Kès), redistribute some of their salary to foreign students, most of whom also benefit from grants.

There is no particular financial obligation for students following the curriculum, and then entering an application school or graduate program that Polytechnique approves of. However, French students who choose to enter a civilian or military corps after Polytechnique are expected to complete 10 years of public service following their admission to the school (i.e. their 3 years at school count towards their time of service). If a student enters a Corps but does not fulfill those 10 years of public service (e.g. resigns from his or her Corps), the tuition fees are due to the school. Sometimes, when an alumnus quits a Corps to join a private company, that company will pay for the tuition fees which are then called the pantoufle (slipper).

The Graduate School

The École Polytechnique organizes various Master's programs, by itself or in association with other schools and universities in the Paris region (École Normale Supérieure, Université Paris-Sud, Université Paris VI, École Supérieure d'Électricité (Supélec), École supérieure d'optique, other colleges in ParisTech, foreign partner universities) on a wide variety of topics. Access to those programs is not restricted to polytechniciens, although they are invited to join them and they make up one half of the students. The following Master's programmes are proposed:

The school also has a Ph.D. program open to students with a master's degree or equivalent.[10] Ph.D. students generally work in the laboratories of the school; they may also be working in external institutes or schools that cannot, or will not, grant doctorates.

About 50% of Master's students and 35% of Ph.D. students at the École polytechnique are non-nationals.

History

The École has more than 200 years tradition:[11]

Notable alumni

Main article: List of École Polytechnique alumni

Notable alumni include many Ministers, one former Président de la République, and many company chief executives. Of the fifty most important and best-performing corporate enterprises in France, nearly half are headed by a Polytechnicien.[12]

References

  1. ↑ A school turned towards the future, official web site
  2. ↑ First Period : General Education, web site
  3. ↑ Partners, official web site
  4. ↑ “Welcome”, the Ecole Polytechnique web site
  5. ↑ Ecole Polytechnique's 'Ingénieur' Program
  6. ↑ The French 'Grandes Ecoles', École Poytechnique web site
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 “Ingenieur Polytechnicien”PDF (5.79 MB) p. 74
  8. ↑ ranking, official web site
  9. ↑ for example, ranking from L'Expansion
  10. ↑ Admission École Polytechnique web site
  11. ↑ A brief History of the Ecole Polytechnique, official web site
  12. ↑ Polytechniciens in today's society, official web site

See also

External links