A renowned surveying agency assessed the French education system, naming it one of the top 25 educational systems in the world. Nearly 25% of the French population is taking some level of education and 10% of these seek higher education. According to the GDP spending on school education, France is way ahead of countries like Japan and Italy. The French education system is headed by the Ministry of Education of France and administered by the academic councils called academies’ which control the working of various universities in their region. There are total 35 such academies in France.

The French education system can be clearly subdivided into three levels, namely: the Primary level, Secondary level and Higher level. Like most of the other countries in the world, the Primary level comprises the schools that imparts education to students from six years of age and has grades up to five levels. Before the primary level, one can find several nursery schools around France that admit students from three years of age. The secondary level includes the college education for the next four levels immediately after the primary education is completed. The four levels in college are followed by three levels in lycee, after clearing which, a student is considered to have passed the Baccalaureat’ level, abbreviated as Bac’.

The Baccalaureat level in the French education system is equivalent to the SATs or ACTs level of education in the United States. There are different subjects in which one can complete a Bac level of education which are also termed as series’. The diverse series include but are not limited to: SSI- series of scientific sciences that has two specializations namely in electrical and mechanical sciences, SI- series scientific which involves subjects like physics, mathematics along with natural sciences and ES- series social sciences.

The French education system consists of institutions called “Grandes Ecoles” which are the premium institutions where the intelligent brains from France take education. These institutions provide specialized education with latest technologies and the students that pass out from these institutes either serve nationally – internationally famous research institutions or serve as high level executives. Being specialized they also have their own stringent methods of examinations for awarding admissions to a selected few brilliant students. Apart from the Grandes Ecoles the French education system has a wide network of Universities spread across the country. The Universities are generally named after the city where the campus is located, and universities with several campuses in one city are named with a numeral following the city name. For example Paris has thirteen universities which are called Paris I, Paris II and so on.