Why French universities do not rank on world stage

The rankings, known in French as the ‘Classement de Shanghai’, were this year published on August 15, and only list three French universities in the top 100, with the highest-ranked - the Pierre-et-Marie-Curie in Paris - at number 40.

The University of Paris-Sud came next, as number 41; followed by the École Normale Supérieure in Paris at number 69.

American universities dominate the list, with Harvard at the top, and only the UK establishments of Cambridge and Oxford making any dent in the overall top 10 (third and seventh, respectively).

In an interview with French news outlet FranceInfo, Gilles Roussel, president of the Congress of University Presidents, and himself president of the Paris-Est-Marne-la-Vallée University, has defended French universities’ lack of recognition in the classification system, which he calls “just one judging criteria among others”.

Although he acknowledged the importance of the rankings, he said that the criteria was based on Anglo-Saxon norms, which do not take into account the French model.

Ultimately, the list places extreme importance on the quality of the research done by the establishments, and in contrast to American and British universities, France separates its teaching universities from its research organisations.

This means that many highly-skilled researchers in France are not seen as part of a university, as they would be in America or the UK.

Roussel explained that for undergraduate students, the rankings have little importance, and that they only start to become useful for those seeking to do a doctorate or post-doctoral placement, because of the emphasis on research.

He added that the French CNRS (The National Centre for Scientific Research; Le Centre national de la recherche scientifique) still manages to attract some of the world’s best doctoral and post-doctoral individuals, who still “continue to reach the highest level in many subject areas”.