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Home > Policy > White Paper, Notice, Announcement > White Paper > FY2003 White Paper on Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology >Part1 Chapter4 Section4.1

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Part 1   Higher Education to Support a Knowledge-Based Society Full of Creative Vitality - New Developments in Higher Education Reform
Chapter 4   Higher Education Reform in Other Countries
Section 4   France
1   Expansion Policies Aim for an 80-Percent Baccalaureate Ratio


Since the mid-1980s, the French government has promoted higher education expansion policies with the goal of expanding baccalaureate holders and increasing the ratio of baccalaureates among those of eligible age to 80 percent, as a means to improve national educational standards. As a result of measures that include opening the way to a baccalaureate to students of vocational high schools (schools entered by over 30 percent of lower secondary school graduates, mainly for the purpose of obtaining vocational qualifications), who had traditionally been ineligible, the said ratio doubled from about 30 percent in 1985 to over 60 percent in 1995, and the percentage of students continuing to higher education surpassed 40 percent.

In recent years, efforts have been made to expand higher education opportunities to adults. The baccalaureate is essentially valid throughout one's life, and adults can also use it to enter universities without entry selection. There are also other measures for adults. In 1994, the Validation des Acquis de l'Experience (VAE) was initiated, under which the national government recognizes three or more years of work experience as sufficient to confer a baccalaureate or an interim university degree, thus allowing people who interrupted their university studies for work the ability to continue education in any course without undergoing a selection process. The number of people using the VAE qualification rose from 816 in 1995 to 4,578 in 2001. From 2000, distance learning opportunities, which were traditionally available through correspondence courses, were further expanded through moves by institutions of higher education to share the Internet with the establishment of digital campuses. Nearly all universities are equipped with digital campus functions. The first ten campuses opened in 2001 and accepted 6,000 students.

Moreover, to address expanded higher education needs, the government is working on the establishment of new universities, expansion of existing universities and enhancement of student aid.

Through the Year 2000 University Plan and the University 3rd Millennium (U3M) Plan for beyond 2000, 13 new national universities were established starting in 1990s, bringing the total number of national universities in France to 89. Under the Student Welfare Plan that began in 1999 and aims to enhance student aid (salaries) and student dormitories, the national government's student aid budget was increased by 30 percent over the five years from 1997 to 2002, and about 30 percent of university students are receiving aid.


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