by Bianca Lancerotto
My name is Bianca Lancerotto, I am a French student in Theophile-Gautier high school in Tarbes, in « Seconde ». I went to Ireland during 3 weeks for a school exchange. The two school systems are completly different. There, I went in Transition Year in Dundalk Grammar School and I discovered many things about Ireland and Irish schools.
In this article, I will talk about the differences between education in France and in Irelande. My comparaison of both school systems is only based on my experiences in these schools, but I will try to make it as general as possible.
The Organisation of classes
Classes are organised differently.
First, classes are 40min long in Ireland while they are 1h long in France. In Ireland, they start school at 9am and finish it at 4pm. In France, we start at 8am and we can finish up to 6pm.
In Ireland they study during 3 years, then, they have a year to do activities, school exchanges, work experience… It is called « Transition Year » or « 4th Year ».
French Baccalaureate vs Irish Leaving Certificate? Nothing in common!
In Ireland, they study 2 years for it, they pass exams and the final mark is the only thing that will appear. In France, we study for 3 years for it, and we are marked from the second year. For this second year, we have to choose 3 main subjects: we will have more classes of these, which count more for the baccalaureate and we have exams on it at the end of high school (for the baccalaureate).
We pass a final exam in French literature at the end of the second year, but all the other subjets are at the end of the last year. In addition to it, we also have the average of our marks and comments on our behaviour recorded for the two last years.
Irish students study 2 years before passing the « Leaving Cerificate ». The only thing that will be seen by colleges is the final mark. They don’t know each mark on each subject or the marks during the year. That is why the students have to work so hard because they can’t fail this exam.
School organisations are completly different
Irish students are used to wear uniforms at school, contrary to French students who can wear whatever they want. It was very interesting to debate on this subject with the students because they don’t like uniforms, so they were very surprised to learn that I would love to have it, because there are a lot of judgement, mocking and bulling because of our clothes.
It is also very common in Ireland to have schools only for the girls or for the boys. Dundalk Grammar School is a mixed school, but I was surprised because except some private schools maybe, all schools have been mixed in France since 1976.
However, the thing that surprised me the most was the religious aspect shown in the school. In France, all schools are non-religious and it would be impossible to see the director or a teacher make a speech with allusions to religion, as they do during the morning Assembly.
Activities
Irish schools makes a lot of interesting activities for students, in addition to normal classes.
Transition year students don’t study for an exam and they have more time than the others. It allows them to run a café at school. The students bake cakes by themselves and they have a coffee machine to make hot chocolates, coffees… They also have many syrups and all drinks are good quality because they have some partner brands. I think that this café is a really good idea because it allows the school to collect money and it is very pleasant for the students as well as the teachers to buy good drinks directly at school, during breaks.
It is very common for Irish schools to create musicals too. It is usually Transition Year students who perform it because they have more time to practice, but in Dundalk Grammar School, all the students can do it if they want to. Everything from A to Z is made by the students, who are managed by professionals to improve the quality of the rendering. This year, the students presented “The Little Mermaid”. The sets were amazingly made by the students as well as the costumes. The main characters were amazing singers and dancers, with a lot of talent. Moreover, all the music that was played during the whole show, was played by students that were in front of the stage. The finish was gorgeous and very professional, a huge contrast with all the school shows I saw in France.
Dundalk Grammar School has a lot of budget and have high quality equipment for its students. It allows them to practice sports, to do school trips, to go to the gym or swimming pool for their PE class, etc.
Different behaviour in society
Irish and French students also have a really different behaviour, and treat each over very differently.
Indeed, in France, nowdays students show a lot of disrespect to the teachers and adults in general. In Ireland, teenagers are much more respectful than in France.
There is a lot of inequalities between men and women all around the world, but in France, they are less present now. It was shocking for me to see that in Ireland, women can have sexist treatment when they just want to practice sports. There, there is a lot of sport clubs only for men and even when the school organised an activity on leadership, the girls were sidelined by the animators. It made me realise that the fight for women’s rights is still not over, and how important it is to keep claiming for more equality.