École Polytechnique

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For other Écoles Polytechniques, see École Polytechnique de Montréal and École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
Logo
Logo
The Arms of the École polytechnique
The Arms of the École polytechnique
The cadets of Polytechnique rushed to the defense of Paris against the foreign armies in 1814. A statue set in the honor courtyard of the school commemorates this deed. A copy was installed in West Point.
The cadets of Polytechnique rushed to the defense of Paris against the foreign armies in 1814. A statue set in the honor courtyard of the school commemorates this deed. A copy was installed in West Point.
The main hall seen from the lake
The main hall seen from the lake

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 Quartier Latin in central Paris (48°50′52″N 2°20′57″E / 48.847747, 2.349043), it was moved to the suburb of Palaiseau in 1976. It is one of the oldest and probably most prestigious constituent of ParisTech (Paris Institute of Technology).

Its motto is Pour la Patrie, les Sciences et la Gloire—“For the Nation, Sciences and Glory.”

Traditionally, a favored goal of the polytechniciens was to join the elite government bodies known as the grands corps techniques de l'État (X-Mines, X-Ponts, X-Telecom), but nowadays some join Ph.D. or master's programs in French or foreign universities.

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[edit] Status

The École polytechnique is a higher education establishment run under the supervision of the French ministry of defense (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. 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).

[edit] 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 Université Paris-Sud, creating a varied and high-level teaching environment.

[edit] The Polytechnicien studies

[edit] Introduction

The Polytechnicien program is quite different from typical university or college studies. While it is sometimes labeled as an undergraduate program, this sticker is convenient but quite misleading.

Studies at Polytechnique cover a scope that usually goes beyond undergraduate studies (students are awarded a Master after the third year of their studies at Polytechnique); 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.[citation needed]

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.[citation needed] Humanities and sports are also mandatory parts of the curriculum, adding to the differences with most university programs.

[edit] Admission

The admission to École polytechnique in polytechnicien cycle is made through a 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.

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

The full dress uniform comprises black trousers with a red strip (a skirt for females), a coat with brass buttons and a belt, an épée and a cocked hat (officially called a bicorne).



[edit] 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 by 8 months during which French students undergo a 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 anachronic, 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). Francophone foreign students do a civilian service. Civilian service can for instance consist of being an assistant in a highschool in a disenfranchised French suburb.

The cadets of Polytechnique parade in national ceremonies, such as those of Bastille Day or anniversaries of the armistices of the World Wars
The cadets of Polytechnique parade in national ceremonies, such as those of Bastille Day or anniversaries of the armistices of the World Wars

Then, begins the common trunk of teaching. Traditionally, this was a very rigid year, where 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 given 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 that they will practice 6 hours every week.

While French students stay under military status during their studies at Polytechnique, and must participate in a variety of ceremonies and other military events, they do not undergo military training per se after they have completed their service in the first year.

In the third year, students have to choose two “majors”, and must do a research internship. The fourth year is the beginning of more professional studies: students not entering a corps must either join a Master program, a doctorate program, another ParisTech college or institute such as the École des Mines or ENSAE, or a specialization school such as SUPAERO 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 transitition to an actual engineering occupation, which requires further technical education.

[edit] Ranking

École polytechnique is ranked among the most prestigious engineering schools of the world. “World Universities Ranking” of The Times Higher Education Supplement placed École polytechnique among the ten best universities of the world. In all rankings published by French newspapers, École polytechnique almost always secure number one place, and according to salaries surveys, its graduates get the highest pay among all French graduates.[[1]]

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 in the scolarity, 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 formations now base themselves on transcripts of all grades.

[edit] Tuition and financial obligations

For French nationals, tuition is free as long as the full curriculum is accomplished, and a salary is received throughout the school years as part of the status of 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 fulfil 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).

[edit] The Graduate School

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'optique, other colleges in ParisTech, foreign partner universities) on a wide variety of topics. The access to those programs is not restricted to polytechniciens, although they are particularly invited to join them and make up one half of the students.

The school also has a Ph.D. program open to students with a master's degree or equivalent level. PhD students are generally working 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 PhD students at École polytechnique are non-nationals.

[edit] History

  • 1794 : The École centrale des travaux publics is founded by Lazare Carnot and Gaspard Monge, during the French Revolution, at the time of the National Convention. It is renamed “École polytechnique” one year later
  • 1805 : Emperor Napoléon Bonaparte settles the École on Montagne Sainte-Geneviève, in the Quartier Latin, in central Paris, as a military academy and gives its motto Pour la Patrie, les Sciences et la Gloire
  • 1814 : Students are involved in the fights to defend Paris from the Prussians.
  • 1830 : Fifty students participate to the July Revolution.
  • 1914–1918 : Students are mobilised and the school is transformed into a hospital. More than two hundred students were killed.
  • 1939–1945 : the École polytechnique is moved away to Lyon in the free zone. More than four hundred polytechnicians died for France during the Second World War (Free French, French Resistance, Nazi camps). However, some alumni chose to collaborate with the Germans.
  • 1970 : The École becomes a state supported civilian institution, under the auspice of the Minister of Defense.
  • 1972 : The first female students, Anne Chopinet, enroll at the École
  • 1976 : The École moves to Palaiseau (approx 25 km / 15 miles from Paris)
  • 1994 : Celebration of the bicentennial chaired by President François Mitterrand
  • 2000 : A new cursus is set in place, passing to 4 years and reforming the curriculum

[edit] Alumni

Alumni of the École polytechnique are traditionally referred to as “X”, or “Xnnnn”, where nnnn stands for the year of admission into the school. They include, among many others :

[edit] Scientists and engineers

[edit] CEOs and industrialists

[edit] French presidents, politicians and public figures

[edit] Military officers

[edit] Four General officers that commanded the French Army and led it during World War One

[edit] Spationauts

[edit] External links

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