Ophelia's Journal.

President Camacho · Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 6:08 pm Post subject:

"Only one of France's 82 universities makes it into Shanghai University's top 50 ranking. Auditoriums are over-crowded, campuses drab and deserted on weekends. Some 46% of all first-year undergraduates drop out. The brightest students do their best to avoid universities altogether..."

At least Sarkozy seems to be doing something about this...

Ophelia · Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 6:44 am Post subject:

I'll go back to the description of University and Grandes Ecoles first.
In some fields you have a choice, and in some fields there's only one way.

University only: Medicine, Pharmacy, Law.

Grandes Ecoles only: Enginnering, veterinary School.

Business, though there are probbably a lot more ways
of studying business than I'm aware of.
If you can't get into one of the prrestigious Grandes Ecoles there are a lot of private schools which deliver non-prestige displomas-- for a lot of money (dubbed "petite école").

University or Grande Ecole: Maths, physics, sciences (not leading to an engineering degree), and Humanities.

Camacho wrote:

Ophelia · Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 1:04 pm Post subject:

Ophelia

University, or Classes Préparatoires?

In some fields you can do either, so the student makes a choice.
If you need to work part time to finance your studies (even with no tuition fees you still need to pay for housing and food), university is the place.
It is meant to accomodate those extra activities.
The Classes Préparatoires will leave you no room for anything else-- although there is an evolution, as with everything else. For example I was very surprised to hear from my colleagues who work in classes prépa at my school that for students nowadays being extremely serious and busy meant just that, Monday to Friday-- even to wipe out your competition, studying on a weekend does not seem to be conceivable, it goes without saying that weekends are for parties and sleeping late.

Anyway, about the choice.
The classes préparatoires will give you instruction in your major and will somehow put pressure on you so that you also study other subjects as advanced subjects.
Engineering students will study maths, science and engineering, plus a foreign language, history, geography, French and philosophy.
To enter the best Grandes Ecoles, they will be selected mostly on things like French and English-- the idea being that they are all excellent at maths, and those who are also excellent in English will get in.

When you have a choice, you may choose the classes prépa because you want to avoid the first two years at university with all the problems.
Recently I've heard another type of reasoning which I found amusing.
The student will sometimes say "I'm not interested in the Grandes Ecoles but I'll still take the classes prépa because I know I'm lazy. If I don't have teachers watching me and putting pressure on me I won't study."

It wasn't meant like this, but the classes prépa offer a solution for a problem that seems to occur more and more often: a wish to learn coupled with a certain leaning towards laziness.
The university is good for students who are motivated and need some freedom to organize themselves. I don't know how much things have changed, but when I was a student they really left you alone and this suited me very well.
At university you would have exams twice a year, but with the classes prépa you get tests all the time, and you write 4-hour papers every Wednesday afternoon. Also you have to go to school, we have a roll call at the beginning of every period, the student has to write justifications if he doesn't come, and there is very little truancy.

Ophelia · Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2008 11:19 am Post subject: The French conquest of Algeria.

The French conquest of Algeria.

It's taken me a long time to go back to this theme, my books about this have been sitting on my desk, unread, and sometimes I tell myself I ought to carry on. I think I might find a lot of things I'm not going to like.

The idea is to read Les Chevaux du Soleil, (the Horses of the Sun) by Jules Roy-- historical novel in thirteen volumes-- the first one of which I have bought. I like the details that are given in historical novels, I find that I understand things better and I remember better-- and also I have a problem with many history books being poorly written-- not that I expect history books to read like thrillers-- anyway, that's the idea, and I'll navigate between this and non-fiction when necessary.

Also I'll write some asides-- after all, anybody who reads my posts but only wants to know about Algeria can skip me and go to wiki...

Yesterday Mr P told us that George Bush had a degree from Yale, so I checked up the details, wondering what subjects he could possibly have studied that had proved so unhelpful in government... Being naturally biased in favour of... is it still called "the arts"?, I had a list of a few potentially unhelpful subjects to prepare for such a career (and no, I won't name any). As it turned out, Geoge W majored in history, and had also studied philosophy, and anthropology.

Now that was a serious blow! History, which I had always thought was the subject for which you have to be able to expand your mind and open up to all sorts of realities... Oh well, nobody likes being caught doing some simplistic thinking or associations. We all have our pantheons of gods, and history is in very good standing among mine-- though if I think about it, it also attracts some weird people with extreme political views, even (very) occasionally among my colleagues.

Now the standard comforting sentences would be "Ophelia, anybody can get a degree from Yale, 1968 was the easiest year of all, everybody knows his Dad bribed the examiners..." No, too easy, I am just disappointed.

Now hang on, there's my neighbour on the third floor who gave me a telling off because I once made him wait for the lift , thus showing my clear lack of education and respect for his university diplomas , various medals and connections at City Hall...He's a notorious local freak, and a retired history teacher...
Right, I'm feeling better already, I'll get over George W being a history major.
---

Later: As I was starting a new sub-topic with Roy's Les Chevaux du Soleil, I have finally decided to continue this writing on a blog, rather than here.


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