Since 1890, the French
baccalauréat
The ''baccalauréat'' (; ), often known in France colloquially as the ''bac'', is a French national academic qualification that students can obtain at the completion of their secondary education (at the end of the ''lycée'') by meeting certain ...
exam, required to receive a high school diploma, has traditionally scored students on a scale (Barème) of 0-20,
as do most secondary school and university classes. Although the traditional scale stops at 20/20, French
baccalauréat
The ''baccalauréat'' (; ), often known in France colloquially as the ''bac'', is a French national academic qualification that students can obtain at the completion of their secondary education (at the end of the ''lycée'') by meeting certain ...
results can be higher than 20/20 due to supplementary "options". French universities traditionally grade in a stricter way than secondary schools, which means that students are unlikely to receive marks as high as they did in secondary school. Famously, in
Preparatory Class for 'Grandes Écoles' (CPGE), an optional 2-4 year preparation for the most elite universities in France, students are graded so harshly that class ranking, rather than individual grades, usually reflects an individual's performance, especially when comparing the grades to secondary or university grades. Often, an average grade of 7-8 in
Preparatory Class for 'Grandes Écoles' (CPGE) can be considered as a satisfactory grade if the best grade in the class is only a 12.
On the
diplôme national du brevet, awarded for passing the 10th year exam (9th grade), and also on
University of Paris, Sorbonne transcripts, scores above 12 on the scale of 20 confer the following ''mentions'' (honors):
* 16–20: ''Mention très bien'': TB
* 14–15.9: ''bien'': B
* 12–13.9: ''assez bien'': AB
Other scales in French schools
In recent years, the French government began to explore possible conversion of the 0–20 grading scale to 0–4 or 0–5. Since 2008, the
College
A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering ...
Gabriel-Séailles, a middle school in southern France, has abolished grading altogether.
Primary schools generally use a 10-point grading scale or a letter grade.
The
European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) scale is gaining popularity in the post-secondary education system, since it is the standard for comparing study performance throughout the
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...
. The GPA grading scale is becoming more and more common as well since it eases the comparison with American students.
Some
Grandes écoles Grandes may refer to:
* Agustín Muñoz Grandes, Spanish general and politician
*Banksia ser. Grandes, a series of plant species native to Australia
* Grandes y San Martín, a municipality located in the province of Ávila, Castile and León, Spain ...
use "exotic" systems, like
Ecole Centrale de Lille, which uses a three-letter scale system:
* A: Excellent
* S: Satisfactory (''satisfaisant'')
* I: Fail (''insufficient'')
History
In 12th Century Europe, students were evaluated by oral disputation in Latin. In the 14th century, some written examinations occurred, but were rare. By the 16th century the
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
was struggling against the
Protestant Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
, and trying to advance Catholic scholarship as a defense of doctrine, to which end
The Society of Jesus
''The Society of Jesus'' ( hr, Družba Isusova) is a 2004 Croatian drama film directed by Silvije Petranović, starring Leona Paraminski and Milan Pleština. The screenplay, written by Petranović, is based on 's 1969 novel of the same name.
Cas ...
was created, and with it Jesuit Colleges.
One of which, the
Collegio Romano
The Roman College ( la, Collegium Romanum, it, Collegio Romano) was a school established by St. Ignatius of Loyola in 1551, just 11 years after he founded the Society of Jesus (Jesuits). It quickly grew to include classes from elementary school t ...
, published the
Ratio Studiorum
The ''Ratio atque Institutio Studiorum Societatis Iesu'' (''Method and System of the Studies of the Society of Jesus''), often abbreviated as ''Ratio Studiorum'' (Latin: ''Plan of Studies''), was a document that standardized the globally influen ...
in 1599, a book of rules for Jesuit education in which official procedures for examinations, competitions, and homework were outlined along with a method for ranking and classifying students.
During the
Ancien Régime
''Ancien'' may refer to
* the French word for "ancient, old"
** Société des anciens textes français
* the French for "former, senior"
** Virelai ancien
** Ancien Régime
** Ancien Régime in France
{{disambig ...
in France (15th-18th Centuries), oral examination was still the most common method of evaluating students.
In 1558, a school in Portugal was the first European school to distribute prizes to the best students, and by the end of the century other schools were following suit. By the end of the 18th century, schools in France were beginning to publish bulletins with student evaluations and class rankings and the Jesuite College at Caen would develop a numerical 4 point ranking ("4 niveaux: 1 = bien; 2 = assez bien; 3 = médiocre; 0 = mal").
Even in the early years of the
Baccalauréat
The ''baccalauréat'' (; ), often known in France colloquially as the ''bac'', is a French national academic qualification that students can obtain at the completion of their secondary education (at the end of the ''lycée'') by meeting certain ...
(created in 1808), the oral evaluation committee members expressed their appraisal of candidates with colored balls (Red for "favorable", white for "abstention", black for "unfavorable").
In the
Second French Empire
The Second French Empire (; officially the French Empire, ), was the 18-year Empire, Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 14 January 1852 to 27 October 1870, between the French Second Republic, Second and the French Third Republic ...
, the representation of colored balls was converted into a numerical system of 0-5, and then in 1890
the numerical system of 0-20 was created along with the modern
French baccalauréat, which comprises several stages of written examinations
In the student rebellions of, 1968, the bulletin of January 6, 1969
recommended a change from the 0-20 grading scale to a qualitative evaluation such as "very satisfactory", "unsatisfactory", etc., Or adopting a more general (A, B, C, D, E) letter system, or a simplified numerical system (1,2,3,4,5). Before the change could be fully implemented, the recommendation was reversed in a bulletin on July 9, 1971 which recommended the continuation of the 0-20 system.
Comparison with American grades
There is no exact formula for converting scores between the French 0–20 scale and American grades,
and there are several reasons why the systems are not entirely commensurate. For instance, some American institutions use
rank based grading and
grading curves, that is, shifting the grades of a class so that the highest scores align with the highest grades on the grading scale and the lowest scores align with the lowest grades on the scale or aligning the median achieved score within the class to a fixed point on the grading scale. Likewise some American institutions use
weighted grades, wherein grades for advanced classes are augmented in the official transcripts to compensate for the difficulty of the classes. French schools use neither,
the result being that in a university, "perfect" 20s are never given,
grades over 14 are extremely rare, and scores over 12 indicate that the student is in the top 10–20% of the class.
About half of all French Law School students at Paris Sorbonne I maintain an average of 10–12,
while the median grade at
Cornell Law School
Cornell Law School is the law school of Cornell University, a private Ivy League university in Ithaca, New York. One of the five Ivy League law schools, it offers four law degree programs, JD, LLM, MSLS and JSD, along with several dual-deg ...
is 3.35 (B+), at
Duke University School of Law
Duke University School of Law (Duke Law School or Duke Law) is the law school of Duke University, a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. One of Duke's 10 schools and colleges, the School of Law is a constituent academic unit th ...
is 3.30 (B+), at
UC Davis School of Law
The University of California, Davis School of Law (Martin Luther King Jr. Hall), referred to as UC Davis School of Law and commonly known as King Hall, is the professional graduate law school of the University of California, Davis. The school rec ...
is 3.25–3.35 (B/B+), and at
Columbia Law School
Columbia Law School (Columbia Law or CLS) is the law school of Columbia University, a private Ivy League university in New York City. Columbia Law is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious law schools in the world and has always ranked i ...
the median GPA is estimated at 3.4 (B+).
Even though no exact conversion exists between the two systems, there are several scales that approximate a conversion and many American universities require that grades from foreign institutions, such as grades in the French 20 point scale, be converted into the
American system on applications.
While other sources suggest that students should not make their own calculations directly for the application.
Table of various conversion scales for university level classes:
Table of various conversion scales for secondary school classes:
The UK Honors degree system compared to grades in France
Converting the UK Honors scale into its French equivalent:
"How to convert U.K. Grades For Master's Degrees In Other Countries"
''Mastersportal.com''.
Honors terminology compared to American and Latin Honors
French diplomas grant "Mentions" similar to American "Honors" or "Latin Honors" titles
References
External links
World Education Services "Education in France"
French – American Grade Comparison
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Academic Grading In France
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
Grading
Grading