I have a S28 who, after spending a year in Paris when he was 13, has become a full-blown Francophone. He went back to France this past summer on an exchange program and plans to go back again next summer. This past summer really boosted his fluency and he will take AP French next year as a junior. He says he wants to go to university in Franch and is very interested in tech, so we started looking at Ecole Polytechnique. I know there’s an established path of American students heading to St. Andrews, Edinburgh, Rotterdam and other places, but haven’t heard about a lot of Americans going to France for university. Has anyone else looked into this or sent their kid to France for university? Pros/cons (other than cost)?
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When we looked into the process, it became clear that French bureaucracy was much greater than almost any other school system & government system our child was looking at.
That would be the biggest con imo. Not only do you need to be a self starter, you also have to be adept at working through red tape and delay.
Also, there is an understanding that not all students will pass courses, graduate on time, etc. It is very much sink or swim environment. There won’t be an existing support system to help if problems arise.
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Thanks for that response. I am well aware of French bureaucracy having lived there for a year. It literally took 11 months for my husband to get his Carte Vitale and I never figured out how to get mine, despite many many calls to their English-language line. On the plus side, my husband now has it for life, so if we ever move back there… Curious if your son/daughter decided to go to school in another European country instead?
Oh wow so Polytechnique is a special situation and unlike going to some of the other European universities or even the other Grandes Ecoles. I am not sure how much you know about how it is organized, but there are a few key points worth knowing.
- It offers very limited majors, basically math/engineering related. Most students were then funneled into Masters programs, I believe, and it was done more or less on academic ranking at the time. Things have changed since they reorganized it in 2017/18 I think so I can’t really speak to the new degree situation and exit pathways.
- It’s a military school dating from the Napoleonic era and military service is done in the first year prior to arriving on campus. I don’t know how that works with international students. Regardless, your student would have a Napoleonic uniform to be worn for certain ceremonial events and marches during their time on campus.
- It is beyond bureaucratic, YES. That’s just kind of France in general, though, and wouldn’t be exclusive to Polytechnique but the military aspect does kind of intensify it, probably. There is not a lot of support/handholding.
- It would be a big culture shock for most Americans and an adjustment in a lot of ways. The French would be a new version of French – VERY heavy on slang and Polytechniciens LOVE creative slang. That is challenging to figure out at first but doable. But also just the system, the military service, etc. bonds the French more tightly in a shared experience prior to the campus part and it can be hard for international students to break in. So they mostly group together. They normally would cluster geographically - say, Chinese students together. North African. Etc. Students are nice though and sports are a good way to make friends.
- Historically, it accepted students by just taking the highest scores out of all who took the math baccalaureate exam in French and French-speaking countries. This was published on campus. The last one to make the cutoff (everyone knew) drank free at the student bar for the first year. Admissions is different now, the class is bigger, and I think admissions is more holistic now, but still very challenging.
- This is subjective, but I just remember the campus as kind of cold and maybe dated (60s architecture, lots of concrete). It’s outside of Paris, and does not have the easy accessibility of something in Paris or a major city. If your student doesn’t have a car, they’ll take the train from a little station that takes a while.
Students are pretty nice, though, and they have lots of fun events. There’s a loose network for parties of other schools. One memory was learning to saber a bottle of champagne in the student bar. X is an impressive school with a lot of respect in France and super strong network.
It’s a really specific experience!
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Thanks so much for that very detailed description. I am assuming you are an alum or did your son/daughter go there? I was not aware of the military angle and think that would be a problem for my son. When we lived in Paris, he insisted on dressing the same way he does in California – shorts, t-shirts and crocs (yes…even in winter) – and the idea of him wearing a military suit of any sort would probably not fly.
I’d appreciate any other info you can share about the Grande Ecoles. I only mentioned Polytechnique because of his strong interest in technology. He’s taking AP Computer Science this year and is very into tech/robotics/coding, so I thought that would be a good fit. I think (based on my limited knowledge) a place like the Sorbonne wouldn’t be a good fit. Not sure about SciencesPo. We have another two years to think about this but because this is such a different path than the US model, I am trying to get as much info as possible to see if it is even an option worth exploring. Thanks!
Polytechnique and a few Écoles have English language direct programs meant for English speakers (whether French, European, or international), distinct from the poorly-funded bureaucratic nightmares that are regular university programs. Even the French-language special programs such as CMIs and IUTs (see below) would be more supportive than licence, especially licence non selective.
Your best bet is to apply to the Écoles via CampusFrance - the process begins in October through December, with a Dec 15 deadline where you list 3 programs at a University or 3 universities.
For Écoles each will list the process on their Parcoursup page and there should be a contact for the dean or professor in charge of the program. (For special programs you go through Parcoursup not Campus France).
https://www.parcoursup.gouv.fr/
Advice:
Go there
https://dossier.parcoursup.fr/Candidat/carte
→ click “modifier les filtres” and then check the box in front of Formations des écoles d’ingénieurs. See what pops up with “international” or English language info. Click than as “favori” to keep them in your folder.
All STEM programs will expect students to have taken Calc BC and AP stats. If “spé PC” is listed it means one AP Physics + AP Chem.
You should start with these three:
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UTC, UTT, are a Grandes Écoles/Université mix.
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IUTs are smaller colleges, with hands on/ experiential learning and co-ops.
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CMI are STEM honors colleges at public universities. Examples
Doubles licences and licences sélectives tend to offer more support than regular programs but still.. not recommended.
Anything at a Université would require an excellent ability to navigate bureaucracy and confusing rules, a high threshold for frustration, etc.
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You’ve gotten some great advice from folks more knowledgeable than I on this topic. But I think that UC-Berkeley and Columbia have programs where there are 2 years spent in France and 2 years in the U.S. And there’s the American U. in Paris, though I don’t know what majors it offers.
Is your son particularly interested in French or in France? If the former, there are options in Quebec, and he might also look into options in Belgium, Switzerland, or other francophone countries.
Also, the National Student Exchange has a number of options where students pay their U.S. tuition rate, but then can go to other universities for u to 1 year per school. So he could do multiple exchanges in Quebec by that method, too.
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I was at Polytechnique a long time ago for a long exchange program (since discontinued). That’s why I’m somewhat fuzzy on the details, although honestly, a number of things have changed since then anyway.
Yes, it’s more than just a normal military uniform. We’re talking THIS military uniform: A military School - École polytechnique
Looks like the hats are slightly updated from my time, but still very Napoleon-ish - a bicorne. They also get a sword.
I’m no expert on current offerings with European programs, but you might look at the Sciences Po dual degree programs - esp the one at Berkeley if you are in California (in state tuition!). My older kid applied to that one. It’s 2 years at one of the Sciences Po campuses (Reims, Le Havre, Menton - each with a geographic focus on Europe/North America or Europe/Africa, Europe/Asia or Europe/the Middle East), and then 2 years at Berkeley. https://sciencespo.berkeley.edu There’s an info session coming up. The majors are all in the social sciences at Sciences Po but there’s some variety, and then at Berkeley your kid could do any Bachelor’s of Arts degree, though the more social science-y ones are easier to connect to the Sciences Po (others might require extra coursework, but you still would probably be saving money overall). Tech friendly majors under the Letters and Sciences school could be applied math, cognitive science, linguistics, etc., but of course tech hires out of lots of majors depending on the role. There’s also a program at Columbia (in the General Studies program)- it’s more expensive. With that one, your kid could do data science or some other majors, but there isn’t much time to explore, esp since he’ll need to do core curriculum requirements as well as major requirements and he would only be there for 2 years.
If your kid really really wants a tech-heavy/robotics curriculum, then the Sciences Po dual degree program is probably not right for him, though. I don’t know enough about what else is out there, though, since my kid wanted a liberal arts experience and wasn’t into tech. Just be aware that in general, European programs are just REALLLLY different from US ones so look carefully at what these programs really are like and how they work. I mean, as an example - how exams work (oral exams may be more prevalent), or how grading works (admissions can be super easy at some schools in Europe but then many many people fail out). Costs are a lot lower, but so is support.
This is also my biased opinion and maybe I’m just influenced by my own experience there a long time ago, but, while the math and engineering programs can be very strong, I’m not sure France is where I would go to get ahead in the tech world, esp coming from California. I mean, it depends on what you mean by tech, but France was just not always the biggest hotbed of innovation in my experience. Just something to consider.
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The handful of Polytechnicians I’ve worked with (I’m on the board of a French company, although it’s owned by a US PE firm) are very impressive (certainly at the level of Oxbridge, and academically more capable than your average Ivy graduate) and deeply connected within the French establishment (which means a lot when it comes to prestigious jobs in France). In my experience there’s a somewhat similar level of intellectual snobbery about X in France to Oxbridge in the U.K. (though French people are not at all self-deprecating like the English), my best description in US terms would be MIT levels of ability with Harvard levels of attitude.
Of course those connections might not be valuable or even accessible to an American student unless they plan to remain in France. And in a sink or swim environment, it will be extremely hard to keep up, especially as a non-native speaker.
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Is your son interested in a path that might lead to graduate school? My best friend did his Master’s and then his PhD (in neuroscience) taught in English at La Sorbonne (which has a master’s in robotics, incidentally) and was able to then subsequently secure his French citizenship because he had been in the country for over 5 years. That said, he was a fluent French speaker before arriving (we did 8+ years of French Immersion in elementary and high school), and was used to university bureaucracy in a system without a lot of handholding (he went to University of Toronto for his undergrad, with its 80k undergrads).
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As the song goes…
You can tell I’m educated, I studied at the Sorbonne
Doctored in mathematics, I could have been a don
I can program a computer, choose the perfect time
If you’ve got the inclination, I have got the crime
…I’ve got the brains, you’ve got the looks
Let’s make lots of money…
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Thanks so much! I really appreciate you taking the time to spell all of this out for me and will definitely look at all of this. Right now, I guess I’m just trying to assess whether this is a 15 year-old’s pipe-dream or an actual possibility. One concern is that while he will be fluent by senior year, it’s one thing to be fluent and another to study/write in another language.
Thanks for sending that link to the Sorbonne program. I don’t really know if he sees himself pursuing an academic career. His primary interest is CompSci and he’s very active on his school’s robotics team, which is a competitive team. His other primary interest is environmentalism/sustainabilty, so he often talks about inventing some sort of robotic device that focuses on that. As for French, he is not fluent yet, but very close, based on his most recent STAMP test. And he still has another 2 1/2 years to improve.
If he’s a casual kid, maybe he’d enjoy studying in southern France rather than Paris. Sciences Po has a campus in Menton - Menton campus. There is also Polytech Nice Sophia, located in Sophia Antipolis, which is a technology hub - https://polytech.univ-cotedazur.fr/.
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He should probably apply to US universities where he can combine tech and French in addition to French “Écoles” (Polytech, above, is another one, a bit like a small Cal Poly).
To make this possible as a livable endeavor for an undergraduate, stay away from anything “Université” including the Sorbonne.
A good US college would be URI for its Engineering/Language programs. Lafayette would be accommodating. Brown too although it’s a reach for everyone. Georgia Tech has a French campus. I think Colby has a first-semester-in-France program.
The INSA, through the Global INSA programs, is a Grande École that welcomes international students and they have a campus, on-campus résidences, dedicated staff for internationals, a French language program, etc. with easy access to interesting cities. I included links knowing you have plenty of time to explore. X Bachelor, ESSEC/Centrale Data science, and GlobalINSA are all in English so should be the focus.
He could also simply go through AFS and spend a year in a French HS (for his interests: spé maths/maths expertes, spé NSI, ie., 9 hours of math, 6 hours of CS a week, then core curriculum of Philosophy, English, Spanish, History, Environmental science, Geography). From there he could apply to both French and American colleges.
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While I don’t have any kids who went the engineering route, all three went from Pre-K through some portion of elementary at a French immersion school. My eldest is fluent and loves visiting France and finding opportunities to use the language. My middle and youngest have little interest in French.
However, middle and youngest are at least proficient in French, and some people might consider them fluent. Eldest took the AP sophomore year, middle took it junior year and youngest dropped French freshman year (last full year of any French speaking class was 3rd grade).
All three have had occasions to speak French recently. For example, middle kid is a grad student, and makes some extra money as a server at a Mexican restaurant (and upscale tequila bar). She had a table of folks visiting from France and they told her up front that their English was not great. She spoke French the whole time, and at the end of the meal, they said her accent and grammar were perfect. So 10+ years removed from AP French, she still is fluent/near fluent.
This is a long winded way to get to my point - I do not think any of my kids would have done well, or nearly as well as they did, in undergrad if they were immersed in college classes in French. There is too much vocabulary in a foreign language, specific to a major, that you just don’t use in regular conversation.
Would they know those engineering terms in English? Very likely, especially with two engineer parents. Would they recognize them in French? Doubtful. And trying to navigate college level material in an already rigorous major, then throw in the foreign language - I think that could be very difficult. I would not want to experiment with my kids to see if it worked out. Better to do a semester or year in France.
One program that has been around for a while is at University of Rhode Island. They have a well established year long study abroad for engineering students. Students intern for an engineering company and take courses to improve their language skills.
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Purdue has a program called GEARE that places students in engineering, CS, or polytech at international universities and for work experiences. There are several options in France depending on what your child decides to major in.
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I see this has already been mentioned, but here is a link to more information on the Georgia Tech program. We looked into this in 2021 when my kid (also a Francophone) was seriously considering GT (chem/premed intentions, in-state). It stood out to us compared to some other abroad options at that time as its curriculum fully supported STEM majors without getting off-track for an 8-semester graduation plus offered graduate level classes for students interested.
Your kid sounds great! This thread is both interesting and informative for many of us in the CC community. Thank you to all who are contributing their knowledge and experience.
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I really appreciate everyone’s advice here. It has given me a lot to think about as we start to navigate the next few years and figure things out. Also wanted to mention the type of company my son dreams about working for called Too Good to Go. They are based in Copenhagen but have offices in many other places, including France and the US. We use the app frequently here in LA (including last night) to get food that would otherwise wind up in a landfill. We had a chance to visit their offices in 2024 and my son was really inspired. It’s a combination of tech and sustainability and solving a big problem – the 40% of food that goes to waste in most countries. If anyone here is an engineer focused on sustainability issues, would love to hear about their career path on how they got there.
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Thanks so much for your perspective on this. Definitely food for thought!