MNers with children at French schools...

[Bonsoir]

If you didn't see the documentary L'école à bout de souffle on France 5 on Tuesday evening, I highly recommend you do.

Careful, though, because Massillon is quite expensive. Much more so than your standard sous-contrat Catholic school. And it's English section reputation is very mixed.

Ah, I see. The head of the college that I mentioned before said exactly the same thing when asked by perplexed parents: it's prestigious and a language that will greatly increase your child's job opportunities...I was and so were the other parents.

Seriously, I'm having second thoughts re:staying here. Might start thinking about moving to the UK. Or Poland. Although poor DP would never speak Polish well enough to feel at home there.

And I won't start ranting about bloody beaurocracy, oh no, I won't because if I do I'll never stop. Just got a letter from CAF asking for more bloody documents for some unspecified reason. GRRR.

Ah, thanks, will check it out. DS is in CM1 so we still have a bit of time, I guess? OTOH I saw on the Massillon website that the inscriptions for the sixieme are finished What, in January?

Not many schools offer anything other than English and German as first foreign languages and the public schools that do are often sink schools (this is a policy for sink schools to attract better candidates because there are exceptions to the carte scolaire for children wanting rare languages). If you are looking for Russian or Chinese as a first foreign language and you want a good school, you are putting the bar incredibly high in the French system.

I know (insider info) that Massillon has tried and failed on more than one occasion to get approved for the OIB option britannique. But the grounds on which it was turned down are not known.

winnybella - you have very little time. You absolutely need your application strategy (eg all schools) to be finalised by September 2012 for entry in September 2013. Researching schools is hard work in Paris - no Good Schools Guide - so I would start looking now! Make a list of all the private collèges within reasonable distance of your home, and start talking to parents/stalking at pick up!

Stalking at pick up? Oh Lord.

I agree with Bonsoir.
Applications for private schools tend to open in the November-December before the September you hope to start. So for entry in Sept 2013, the dossier will need to be submitted in November - December 2012.
Even if the deadline they quote on their website for applications is January, early applications get first consideration.

When applying to our Catholic school, (for PS!), applications opened on December 1st. I was there at 9.01 on December 1st to collect an application form and returned it, completed, with cheque and ID photos and ^lettre de motivation" later that same day! You can download the application form from their website these days, but at the time, you had to go and collect one on the first day. In theory, they continued to accept applications until mid Jan., but it was common knowledge that you needed to get the dossier back to them within the first week to stand a chance.

If there were better ways of researching French schools, believe me, I'd tell you! But there is often very little to go on - basic proprietary web sites and almost zero published opinion.

Looking at pupils is quite revealing wherever you live, IMVHO!

Schools that have a sibling policy (and lots do) send out a letter in the early part of the Autumn term to parents, asking whether then intend to enrol un petit frère or une petite soeur. By the time the dossiers are available to the general public without children already at the school, all the sibling places have been allocated and there often aren't that many places left over.

Just had a look at the Palmares des lycees that Express did and the college that DS was supposed to go to is the last in the department And the head was saying how they have so many good students etc

Okaaay...

Sorry, the lycee is the last, not the college, but as they are the same establishment...

Massillon is ranked 315th nationally, out of 1935.
32nd out of 89 lycées in Paris.

They slipped down the rankings quite badly last year (down 156 places nationally).

Not bad to be 315 nationally but given that you are in Paris proper where there are tonnes of good college and lycées, I would look around.

Ok, just seen your post about the ranking of your allocated college.
Definite time for a rehink, IMHO!

Oh, yes, definitely. Tell me, do the private colleges give priority to the children who live locally? As the public schools do?

I'm just curled up in a corner gibbering. DS is going to have to board. We won't know where we're going to be from one year to the next on December 1st!

At what age does one have to get scary stalkery about finding a good school?

And if you end up up with a series of terrible primaires is it worth getting stuff from the CNED or cours Ste Anne to supplement?

There is no carte scolaire for private schools and many of them have children coming in from the suburbs - your DS could apply anywhere in Paris. But, realistically, it is much easier to live near school so your children can pop home when they have three free periods in the middle of the day. And don't forget the early starts at collège - days can be really long (8am to 6pm).

Fraktious - some schools (including my DSSs', and it is a very good school) give priority to forces families!

Ours does not seem to. The have kids travelling from quite far afield, so I don't think they operate a catchment system.

I think they are looking for:

-- siblings
-- excellent carnet scolaire - after siblings, this is the most impirtant factor at college level

Then:
-- fabulous lettre de motivation
-- committed and supportive parents

Also it will play a rôle if you can demonstrate some form of catholicism and if you are known to the school (ie a good old piston).

Greythorne - you have to take those national rankings with a pinch of salt because some private lycées do outrageous creaming/replacing to boost their results whereas others are much kinder and let all their pupils stay on to do their bac.

I have 3 kids in French schools and I'm honestly delighted with the standard of education they're getting here, especially when I compare with what my friends' kids in the UK are doing - and above all, the prospects for young adults leaving the system! I'm also a full-time student and extremely impressed with the knowledge and self-assurance of the young people I study with! The careers guidance also seems to be excellent here!

Of course there are good schools and bad schools. We have moved several times and our choices of school depended on where we were living. The small village school (in a wealthy commuter village) was definitely the worst! All 3 stagnated there and the younger 2 were quite behind when they arrived at their new school three years on.

The younger 2 are now in a large, inner-city state primary where the teaching is EXCELLENT. Not as many extra-curricular activities (skiing lessons etc), but they do sport 4 times a week and have 3 hours of Italian lessons with a native speaker. Both are bright kids and are being pushed as hard as they need to be.

My oldest is a weekly boarder at a Catholic secondary school (we're Jewish, but the religious content is negligeable, vs the excellent teaching). She was struggling in her state school last year as she's highly gifted, but with weak social skills, but she's thriving now and getting excellent results :)

Re costs: Boarding school (internat) costs ?350/month (includes school fees, residential fees + meals and extra tutition where needed). Travel to/from the school is free (50 miles away - conseil général provides a bus pass).

When I had all 3 in a private primary, it was ?95/month for the whole family (?45 for one and ?75 for 2, I believe). Meals were extra at around ?3.50/meal (if enrolled full-time - occasional was dearer).

In the state primary I currently pay just ?0.73/meal, as I'm a single parent on a low-income and the city council heavily subsidises this kind of thing!

Okay, so if I would need to apply at the beginning of the next school year then DS needs to gets really good grades this year, yes? Do the colleges contact the primaire and ask for bulletin scolaire? How do they make their selection (after obv., the siblings and the other priority kids)?

x=post, Greythorne. Will they be looking for grades from all 4 years of primaire?

Normally for sixième you would send photocopies of all the CE2 and CM1 bulletins with the dossier, and then you would send copies of all the CM2 bulletins as and when you receive them.

Fraktious
Our local state colleges are uniformly dire.
Our local (catchment) primary is pretty poor.
Our maternelle is sort of Ok.

But we chose to go private from the get go (PS) so that we were in the private system right away as it might seem hard to get a private place in PS at a great Catholic school (where sibling policies seem to fill every place) but we knew it would only get harder as time went on.

We applied the same logic to the Wednesday bilingual section, too, and enrolled DD at the first entry point (which happens to be grande section) even though I don't feel like she has got tonnes out of the programme yet but I knew trying to coach her for entry later when the exam is very tough was a tall order. Entry at GS level is an oral only as they can't read or write at that level. Entry at CP and above entails a verytricky written paper.

winny, at my daughter's collège, we had to provide the past 2 years' bulletins, but I don't think they contacted her school.

We didn't apply until mid-May, had an interview with the principal in early June and got an acceptance letter a couple of weeks later.

Don't know how they made the selection, but at the interview, he asked her about her favourite subjects and if she had a passion (hers is chemistry - wants to be a research chemist!) and seemed impressed with her answers. He also asked about extra-curricular activities. Regular participation in sports at a competitive level (she's a county-level gymnast) seemed to score her a few points :)