France: Prospective Visitors

From Foreignliving

Revision as of 01:56, 14 February 2007

Hi Everyone, This is the initial version of the studying in france guide. I hope to add some points soon:

STRONG POINTS:

- Education is free in all the education programs in french (except business and/or programs in english)

- French Universities are ranked among the best Universities in the World (around 10-15 unis in the top 200).Some  
  Universities such as University of Toulouse and Sorbonne University dating back around 700 years.

- The real french strength are the specialized french engineering schools called "Grande Ecoles" about which the 
  ranking institues/people don't know much. I am quite sure that if they are entered in the ranking fairly, they would be 
  among the the best in the world

- French business schools dominate europe. The best business school in Europe is also french (HEC)...yes higher than LSE 
  check out website of (HEC - Paris)for ranking and other details.

- France is a Social Welfare State. The government pays about 40% of your house rent and this is valid for all the students 
  and people with not too high salaries.

- The health is for a large part free and state owned... so no payment for medicine/hospitalizations etc

- Its the most visited country in the world and its a really beautiful country

- Good chances of getting an academic scholarship/Industry scholarship for Phd and eventually a job if you are in the 
  domains of electrical engineering, electronics or telecommuniations

- You can travel around in europe quite cheaply and without any visa problem (around 15 schengen countries i.e. no visa 
  required).... this is something that people going to Uk/USA would probably miss out

WEAK POINTS:

- Very difficult to survive without knowing french
 
- If you are coming here just for a Masters degree than please be ware that the french education system is totally 
  different from that followed around in the world and the coursework of masters is considered as merely a revision of 
  concepts (i.e. usually 5 four hour classes in two weeks and its done). So theres no "learning" time or aspect. Actually
  you get about 3 months to complete 8 courses, so you can well imagine. The research part of masters is however much 
  better. So better come here for a phd/job

- The English language based Masters programs are quite costly usually although some have found cheap ones also

- Getting good jobs can prove to be difficult particulalry if you are not in the electrical engineering, electronics or 
  telecommuniations domain

In any case, France remains to date an interesting destination for studies.

Please check out the edufrance website http://www.edufrance.fr/en/ for more details.

I will be updating this page soon.

Regards Usman.