About the French school system... (Aka why I'm probably gonna suicide by the end of the year)

Logo of the school I wanna go to.

(Just kiddin, of course). Well well well... I'm gonna talk here about the path you have to chose if you want to do an « intellectual » work (scientist, engineer, business man...). If you wanted to become a cook, or a plumber, or a technician, you would have to go through another system, which I don't know well.

Just some things, before I start: in France, grades go from 0 (you fail) to 20 (epic win), and from collège to high school, classes are numbered (6^th being the first you attend, 5^th the second, ... terminale the last one).

For the beginning, same as other countries, from what I've read : we start in what is called here maternelle (at the age of 3, I think), which is not mandatory. Then, at the age of 6, we enter primaire, where we learn to read, count, a bit of geography and history, and some English (depending on your primaire). Then, it's collège, from 11 to 15 (which is just soooo tricky when we learn English... It can lead to awkward situations, when someone says : and what class are you in ? And you are 14 and you answer « Well, I'm in... uh... college. » ^^). At the end of it, we have a national exam, called “Brevet des collèges”, with math, history, geography, French, where you need to reach an average of 10. Then, you go to high school (lycée), for 3 more years. At the end of your first high school year, you have to choose whether you want to study litterature (L), science (S), or economy (ES), and the classes you follow will then depend on that choice. (I chose S, which means I had ¾ of physics, chemistry, math and biology/geology, and ¼ of sport, French, English, German, history, geography, and arts) (arts being an option). To graduate and enter études supérieures, you need to reach an average of 10 in the baccalauréat, national exam n°2. (Btw, fun fact: thanks to options (latin, greek, music, plastic art, a third language, or extra sport) (you can choose 2 of them), it's possible to reach 21 points out of 20 on that exam) (but it's not usual, as you may have guessed).

There, you're supposed to be 18, and ready to enter interesting studies :D
How does that work? Well, you have 3 main ways:

-universities, which are public, and which cannot refuse you (to get in you just have to apply). You can become a teacher, lawyer, scientist, doctor...

-after graduating ingeneer/business school, which deliver a 5 year formation (ending with a diploma). To get in, you either have to send an appliance, with all your grades of high school and comments from your teacher, or to pass a competitive exam, depending on the school, but once you're in, you're in (unless you're especially lazy or insubordinate).

-classes préparatoires, which is the path I've chosen. It's “A French specific two years programme leading to a nation-wide competitive examination into a "Grande école", one of the top French engineer or business school system.” (I don't know if you've heard of Polytechnique (also known as l'X) (in science), HEC Paris (business), ENS Paris some of the best “Grandes écoles” in France).

To enter, you have to submit an application with all your grades from the last two years, and comments from your teachers, and if the prépa (short for CPGE, classes préparatoires aux grandes écoles) likes your application and thinks you're good enough, you're in. If not... Well, that's sad for you.
In science, you can choose for example MP (math physics), PC (physic chemistry), PSI (physic, engeneer science), or BCPST (biology, chemistry, physic, earth science). As you may have guessed, I chose the last one. It gives me access to competitive exams allowing me to become either an engineer in “nature” (agriculture, water gestion...), a vet, or a geologist. How do the competitive exam work? Well, every student goes through the exam, and the best chose the school they want, the others getting the left overs, or nothing. (=> If I fail, I can redo (twice) the last year. And if I fail again, I've lost two to four years where I didn't get a diploma, and I have to start over. Nice, isn't it?) (But you can manage to go in the 3rd year of uni if your teachers agree). Besides, if you wanna be a vet, 500 places, 3000 students. :D You have to be one of the bests.

Of course, due to that, we go through a lot of pressure, and some students cannot handle it; one of my classmates had a nervous breakdown last year (and thus stopped), and there are seldom students that takes their life. You cannot be ill, you cannot miss a day, you cannot be weak. (Or you have to be good). The system will not wait for you. You either have to be wicked smart or work all day long (or love what you do), because only the better student get precisely what they want, and if you don't work, be sure that others will. I'm lucky enough to be interested in one of the exams that is the less wanted (and I understand things quickly); I though have time to do other things, and enjoy my life, but it's not common. One of my classmates/friends wants to be a vet. We go through 8 hours of classes from Monday to Friday, and we have 2 oral exams (1h30) plus a 3.30 hour long test each week (or course, what matters is not the grade but the rank). Each day, she works for 5 hours in addition to what we already go through. (On a 24hday, if you take away sleep time, eating time... well you'll see she works all the time) (and they are almost all like that where I study) (freaks me out sometimes) (but I'm in a "good"/selective prépa though). (And 8h/day on week end).
Fun fact: Remember what I said about the grades, from 0 to 20? With 7,43, I'm the 23^rd on 48 students, (well, 47, now). It's nearly impossible to have 20, (but quite easy to have zeros).

It's really hard, but it's also fascinating. I've learnt more in almost two years than I have in the rest of my life, and I now have extensive knowledge in a lot of topics. (Reason why I'll never regret that path, even if I fail. Which I hope won't happen).
Well, there! Now you know it all!

Hope you found it interesting, sorry for writing that much, thanks for what you've written (because it was really cool) (and you're all awesome!!!), have a nice day, and DFTBA!

PS: (If you have any question I could answer that you want to ask for the “Learning week”, please put it in the comments, cause I don't know what would interest you).Edited the 03/25/2012, added complements.

American Education system (abridged)

Simply put, the American education system is a convoluted mess, but I will try my best to give a brief overview of the entire system and then talk a bit about Knox, the college I go to.

Okay, kids start going to school at ages three to five. Three and four year olds go to pre-school and five year olds go to kindergarten. Many kids only go to one year of pre-school; you don't have to go until you are four. Kindergarten is mostly for learning to read and write.

Elementary school varies from place to place. My school system has 1st-3rd graders in the elementary school and 4th-6th graders in a different school, the upper elementary school. Then Middle school is 7th and 8th grade and high school is 9th-12th grades. Wide numbers of subjects are covered in these years, but in general it's all to teach kids how to pass tests by memorization rather than actually live in the real world. That's a major generalization that obviously has many examples to the contrary, but tests are used as a check to make sure you have learned something instead of applying it to a real world practical situation usually. This depends on the school and teachers though. Other than that, kids take numerous standized tests, some of which do nothing, others determine how much funding your school gets with higher scores on average gives higher funding from the government, and others determine the kids' entire future like the SAT and ACT which are taken in the spring of junior year and can be taken again in the fall of senior year (11th and 12 grades). If you don't score well on those, then you likely won't get into a good college or won't get into one at all, your grades matter too, but for some reason a ton of schools put a TON of importance on these two tests.

Now here's where it gets a bit messy. We have several kinds of schools here. There's public schools, which most kids go to, that are funded by the states. Then there's private schools which are for profit corporations basically and like colleges they have tuition fees (and can be very, very expensive), room and board fees, and the like. They often have the stereotype of being for snobby, rich kids types, but that's not necessarily true. You can get into one, and you normally have to apply to get in, based on merit. Then there are religious schools, mostly Catholic schools which are like private schools in that they aren't run by the government. They are run by the Catholic church and the religious leaders of that specific area. They teach a much more religiously integrated curriculum, which is supposed to be illegal for public schools, separation of church and state, but that doesn't always stop religious politicians from claiming that since evolution is a "theory" that creationism should be considered a scientific theory and taught in public schools, but I digress.

Colleges, lots of fun stuff here. They come in all varieties and price levels. They go from the two year community colleges that are local and relatively inexpensive that are good from lower income families and are a pathway to getting into a four year college or university (there's a difference between them, confusing, I know but I will get back to them in a second), but they are often looked down upon as not as good education wise. Again depends on the school. Colleges and universities, the difference between them is universities have graduate programs for getting your Masters in a certain subject and colleges don't. They only have an undergraduate program, like my school, Knox College. Colleges and universities can be either public or private. Public schools are typically cheaper than private schools, which are run like a corporation. Private schools can get extremely expensive. According to the Huffington Post, the most expensive private university in the US is Columbia University at $45,290 per year for four years not including if you stay for their graduate program! Yikes!

Colleges typically are known as having excellent specific departments. For example, Harvard Law. Knox is a liberal arts school, meaning that it has strong art, English, humanities, philosophy and social science programs. I actually chose Knox because of its creative writing program. I took some creative writing classes and ended up changing to philosophy. You have to meet certain requirements to finish your major and minor (the areas you took the majority of your class). You also have to meet other requirements depending on the school such as Knox has an experiential learning requirement and a diversity requirement on top of the general minimum credits you have to take in math and science and other basic subjects. I took astronomy, which knocked out two birds with one stone and gave me a math and science credit, so I haven’t had to take another math or science again, and won’t need to.

After I graduate I could enter the job market, or I could go on and go to another school to get my Masters and even try to get a PhD and become a doctor.

I think that’s the basics. I probably left out a ton of important information, so if you have questions ask and I will try my best to answer them.

Edit: After Sarah's questions about the difference between colleges and universities, I thought I would edit in my answer to her questions in, just in case.

You get a Bachelor's degree in the subject you majored and minored in when you graduate from a college, same with graduating from a university. The Bachelor's degree comes from graduating an undergraduate program (the first four years at a college or university).

You don't need to go to college first to go to a university. They both have four year undergraduate programs. A university is a college in the same way that a young adult book is a book, all young adult books are books, but not all books are in the young adult genre. All universities are colleges, but not all colleges are universities. If you go to a college for the first four years you can apply to a university to go an additional two years to get your Master's degree on top of your Bachelor's degree, but you can choose to go to a university for the first four years instead.

School Down Under

Fun fact #1: Almost nobody in Australia calls it 'down under'. That's your nickname, so I'm using it for your benefit.

School here starts at 4, with Kindergarten (Kindy for short). This is usually only 2 days a week, and isn't compulsory. It's basically vaguely structured play time, all day. Proper actual school starts at 5, with Pre-primary, which is compulsory. This is where you start to learn to read and write, but it's still mostly play time, and I think it may also be only some days a week.

Fun fact #2: All schools in Australia have a uniform (except a few weird alternative type ones). In primary schools and public high schools, this is usually a coloured polo shirt and shorts. In private schools, it's a blazer, tie, trousers, and high socks. Girls' schools, bafflingly, will add a stupid hat or a little scarf too.

From Year 1 (5-6-year-olds) to Year 7 is Primary school. Most kids will go to a public primary school, and barring special circumstances it's your local one. Primary school covers maths up to long division and areas of circles, masses of Australian history (which everyone universally hates), very very simple essay writing, and a dumbed down version of the scientific method. I'm pretty sure a foreign language is compulsory too, though which is up to the school, the most popular being French, Indonesian, and Japanese.

Fun fact #3: In year 5, every kid is taught to play the recorder. Apart from making a truly terrifying noise, this accomplishes very little by way of musical education.

Secondary school ('high school') is where things get interesting. Year 8 to 10 (ages 12-15) you learn algebra, basic trig and geometry, start properly analysing books, learn more Australian history and finally some world history, and learn a fair whack of chemistry, biology and physics. You can choose whether or not to continue learning a language (most don't) and you can start choosing subjects, usually in the arts and technology area. (I picked media studies and French.)

Fun fact #4: It's very common at the start of high school for about a third of your friends to switch to private schools, which differ by being a) religious, b) unisex, c) much more focussed on sport, music, and other extracurriculars and d) extremely expensive.

Year 9 is the last standardised test (after year 3, 5 and 7). In year 10, everything is streamed (separated by difficulty) and year 11 and 12 you have to pick all your subjects (between 4 and 6) which you'll get examined in. English is compulsory, as is at least one maths or science class. There are exams every semester until the end of year 12, when you do a tertiary entrance exam. Your exam results are pummeled beyond belief, and you are given a percentile rank called an ATAR, which basically reflects the percentage of the state you beat.

University admission is done automatically - no letters, interviews, or essays*. You enter preferences online. Courses have a minimum score and a place limit, and get filled by the top students first. University isn't free, but it is massively discounted if you're an Australian citizen, and the government lets you defer payment on your tuition through an interest free loan which gets paid back through the tax system. It works well - since there's still a cost, not everyone goes to university, but if you want to, you can. Lots go to technical schools (TAFE), become apprentices, or just start working instead.

A bachelor's degree is the most common starting point. It usually lasts 3 years, with an optional honours year where you do a project. Then you can do a masters (1-2 years) and a PhD (I have no idea how long this takes), although most people stop with a bachelors. You do 4 units a semester, for a total of 24 over a degree, and a major is basically anything you've studied at least 8 units in (although in engineering and stuff I believe it's a bit stricter with a proper program to follow).

University is university. College refers to on-campus accomodation, usually for rural or international students. There is no such thing as a minor, except in the 'not allowed into the uni tav' sense. Postgraduate degrees are usually on the same campus or at least part of the same university, so there's also no such thing as 'grad school'.

Whew, that was a bit longer than I intended.

tl;dr, SCHOOL LOL.


*Except medicine, which has an IQ test and an interview to make sure you're not a psychopath.

The Finnish Education System According To Me

Time for me to make an attempt at explaining the Finnish education system, while also trying to keep it brief and readable. I predict both of these aspects are going to suffer. I’m sorry, it’s going to be a snooze fest.

The Finnish education system is valued around the world, it has been stated to be the best one by a variety of researchers, and exams like PISA (Program for International Student Assessment) have supported this. It is indeed something of a pride to Finland, and I agree it is an excellent system, to a certain point. At university level, I, personally, start seeing cracks in it, but never mind that, we have other matters to discuss here.

Education is free from the get go. Only in upper secondary (term explained later) do you have to start paying for books, the rest still remains free. At university level you only have to pay a small, mandatory fee to belong to the Student Union, which looks after students' rights - note, this is not a tuition fee of any sorts ***. The fact that education is kept free, and that all educational institutions are looked over by a single government organ, pretty much guarantees that students have as equal as possible a chance at getting educated. This government organ, among other things, regulates what each student should have learned by certain point and looks over the quality of teaching provided.

Now, before I continue: You should note that the Finnish educational system and its levels are not really compatible with the American one, so, though I might state so and so is the equivalent of so and so of American variety, you should not take it literally and project your education system directly onto ours. I’m making the comparisons simply to make it slightly more relatable.

At the age of 7 (or 6, if you were born towards the end of the year like I was) Finnish children enter what we call ala-aste, which literally translates to ‘lower level‘. It is our equivalent of the elementary school. This stage lasts for 6 years, covering grades from 1-6. When we are the age of 13 (or 12, again if you were born later in the year) we move on to ylä-aste, which directly translates to ‘upper level’. It is our equivalent of middle school or junior high. The dictionary translates it to upper comprehensive school, which is the term I prefer to use if I have to translate the word. This stage lasts for three years, covering grades 7-9. During the last year of upper comprehensive school, it is time to start making some important decisions.

After graduating from upper comprehensive school, at the age of 15-16, you are done with compulsory education. You can choose to enter lukio (upper secondary) or ammattikoulu (vocational school). There are also some specialized institutions that are pretty much different types of vocational schools, they are more specific on the fields they offer. There is, for example, kauppaoppilaitos (a trading and business school) and maatalousoppilaitos (an agricultural school). You can also try getting a job directly after upper comprehensive school, which is extremely difficult without career specific education, or gaining some sort of an apprenticeship contract that enables you to earn a mainly vocational-school-provided degree by working and occasionally attending exams. The main options, however, are upper secondary and vocational school.

Vocational school is traditionally seen as a more relaxed option of the two and it is easier to get in to (lower grade average requirement). It directly starts to prepare you for a job in the field you choose to study and has very little general studies - it usually only takes three years to gain a basic degree. From these schools you can graduate to become things like an electrician, a car mechanic, a travel agent, a chef, a practical nurse, a media assistant, an artisan, a carpenter, a hair dresser, a cosmetologist, a datanome, or you can get a Vocational Qualification business and administration degree…etc. You get the picture. After earning your degree you can choose to start working or continue to ammattikorkeakoulu (polytechnic/ university of applied sciences).

Upper secondary (our equivalent of high school…and more) is traditionally seen as the more prestigious option of the two, and is known to be difficult to get through. This is the route to take if you want to enter university and have dreams of becoming a lawyer, a doctor, and so on. This is also the route I went with. Upper secondary does not prepare you for a specific field, instead it is pretty much deeper level general studies, and it lasts for three years. It has earned its reputation as difficult to get through because of a large amount of coursework and exams. Every school month ends in a week filled with nothing but exams. Sometimes students might end up having to go through seven exams in seven days, if they happen to have a lot of courses that month. Each exam requires plenty of reading as the study area usually covers the whole course book. Top this off with the actual regular school work, and some smaller exams, and it might start to look like a slightly intimidating picture, at least for those who didn’t attend it. (Those who did attend and stick with it, and paid at least some attention during classes, would likely tell you that it isn’t as bad as it may seem. You get used to it.)

The culmination of all this testing and work is ylioppilaskirjoitukset, the Matriculation Examination, the mother of all exams, and perhaps the main reason for people considering upper secondary to be difficult. It is a strictly supervised series of exams, created, held and graded on a national level. There‘s one round of exams in the spring time and one during fall, dividing your exam sprint to two. You are required to pass this examination in order to graduate and become a ylioppilas. The Matriculation Examination tests everything you have learned during the 3 years of upper secondary and consists of a minimum of 5 written exams and 1 listening comprehension one, though many students end up going through at least 6-7 written exams and 1-2 listening comprehension exams. Each written exam lasts for 6 hours and all of them contain only essay-based questions, foreign language exams being an exception on this (they include shorter questions, shorter essays and even some multiple choice). Listening comprehension exams last for a couple of hours. So, essentially, 6 times 6 hours and then some. You can imagine students will be pretty tired by the end of it all, especially when teachers tend to also hold practice exams to prepare them - these practice exams also last for 6 hours, providing the 'authentic feel'. I know I was tired of it all before even getting to the actual Matriculation Examination exams. My butt was pre-numbed for the occasion.

If all goes well and you pass, you will get your student cap and you are free to apply to higher education: Yliopisto (university) or ammattikorkeakoulu. Sometimes people choose to even go back and attend a vocational school instead. But I’m not here to talk about that, I’m just going to cover the university side of things.

In order to get into university, you have to go through an application exam. That’s right, after that hellish series of butt-numbing exams, there are more exams to go through. There is one for each major and each university. If you were to apply to study, well, say, archaeology and you apply to study it at University A, University B, and University C, it means you will still have three separate application exams you have to go through, despite it being all for one major. If you are lucky, some of the universities might have the same exam material (usually a nice hefty book or two) though - they sometimes decide to coordinate this out of mercy towards future students. There are some majors (I.e. geography, biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics) that accept people without application exams, if they have done really well at the Matriculation Examination of a particular subject, but a lot of people do not do well enough, so they too are stuck with the application exams. What makes things more challenging in the ‘getting-in’ business is also the fact that, you are directly competing to get in: Each major at each university usually accepts only 9-20 (10 being a common number here as I've witnessed) new students per year, and there are hundreds, if not thousands of applicants for each major at each university. Hence, getting in is not a given in any field. With law and medical school things are further complicated by this strange law that you can only apply to one law and one medical school, ever.

On to discuss university! Usually once you get accepted, you will have the right to study at that university for 7 years. Now, I have very little idea about how degrees other than humanities ones work, besides than knowing that they are more strictly scheduled and generally get more done than I feel like I ever do, so I’m not really going to cover anything outside of my “jurisdiction”, so to speak. I will be sticking to a degree in humanities, and how I perceive it to work.

Here’s how it works: You are in. Go nuts. Do what ever you want. It’s all on you. No one is going to tell you what classes to take beyond a small set of major-specific basic courses. You will need a certain amount of credits to get a degree though, and you do need to go through certain sets of courses, but basically it’s all up to you to get them scraped together, no one is going to look after you on that (unless you happen to become friendly with a lecturer, who then starts to worry about you if they don‘t see you shuffling down the corridors apathetically every now and then). For me, this plentiful freedom continues to be a bit of an anxiety-causing fact in our field, especially when I feel like I can’t gather together enough credits. I’ve grown jealous of sciences and their stricter schedules, first of all, they actually have schedules, and they get more credits on courses. But I digress…

The speed with which you achieve your Bachelor’s degree completely depends on your own studying speed in humanities, but usually it takes 2-3 years to get a B.A. of Humanities (which comes equipped with an M.A. in philosophy, I don‘t know how, don‘t ask, it says in my papers I‘m doing a B.A. in humanities and M.A. in philosophy, I do not question it, nor should you). After that it gets more fuzzy. It all depends a lot on your own chosen pace. Getting to MA might take around a couple of years. I’m not sure, I haven’t figured that out yet. Basically I’m of no help what so ever on things beyond B.A.. It’s like asking me what being dead feels like. No idea, I’ll let you know when I get there. Oh no wait, I can’t, I’m dead.

That's about it from me, really.

P.S. I feel like this is important to mention but I couldn’t fit it smoothly into any of the paragraphs above, so here it is: Our university’s course grading system goes from 1 to 5, 1 being the same as F (fail). Oh, and your grade has nothing to do with the amount of credits you will get, so long as you pass you are good.

P.P.S. The image above the text is The lyre of Apollo, the symbol of an upper secondary graduate, ylioppilas. There is a golden lyre cockade on the student caps of the graduates and it is tradition that graduates also buy their mothers a golden brooch of the same symbol. Also, the silhouette of Apollo’s head is the insignia of The National Matriculation Examination Board (the organizers of the Matriculation Examination exams). Bit of an Apollo fixation, yes.

*** (Yeah, remember seeing these three asterisks earlier in the text? Me neither. But whaddayaknow, they actually had a purpose!) For foreign (exchange) students, there is also a tuition fee of 3000€ (same for every university). This is a new thing that they began to implement only a couple of years ago, saying it is merely a trial of sorts. I don’t know if it is a permanent arrangement, but Finnish students and like-minded people greatly oppose this for a variety of reasons, one being pride over free education and the equality it provides.

- Mia/sterling

Malaysian Education System

In Malaysia one begins pre-school/kindergarten between the ages of 3-6. Like the other countries, it's mostly a few hours of structured play time and a little bit of learning as you advance with age. Pre-school education isn't compulsory and there are very few public facilities. Most people send their children to privately owned kindergarten so it can be expensive.

Primary education starts at 7, and goes on for 6 years (Standard 1-6). The Curriculum is standardized and you take the Ujian Penilaian Sekolah Rendah (UPSR; Primary School Evaluation) at the end of it. We learn the usual Science, Math, Malay Language, English as a second language which are tested in the UPSR. Then there are other subjects that there are no standardized tests for. It's automatic advancement through the grades even if you fail, which is a really stupid system.

After Primary School, you advance into Secondary School for 5 years (Form 1-5). For the first 3 years, everybody learns the same things as they did in Primary School, only deeper. There's additional tested subjects like History, Geography and Life Skills. At the end of Form 3, you sit for another standardized test: Penilaian Menengah Rendah (PMR; Lower Certificate of Education). Following this, students are allowed to choose which streams to enter. The options are Science, Arts and Sub Science (mixture of both). The Science stream is straightforward, so you learn Biology, Chemistry, Physics etc. In the Arts, you can choose to actually do art, business, accounts or more vocational subjects. But no matter what stream you are in, you still do certain core subjects similar to the ones in the PMR. Finally at the end of the 5th year, everybody sits for the Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM; Malaysian Certificate of Education).

Once you're done with the SPM, you can either continue on to Form 6, Matriculation or take a Pre-University Program (Like A Levels). They're all equal to each other and only differ by duration. This is where it gets tricky and unfair. Public Tertiary Institutions in Malaysia work on an affirmative action policy where Malays and indigenous people (Known as Bumiputeras " Original inhabitants of the land) are given almost 90% of the spots. Considering 30% of the Malaysian Population are made of Chinese, Indians and others, most non-Bumiputeras don't end up in the public system after high school. The Public system is heavily subsidized and almost free.

So like me, we go into Private Tertiary Institutions where we pay through our noses for education. They're all pretty new and aren't any older than 50 years. After high school, we join private colleges for our pre-university education where we either do Foundation courses or Australian, Canadian, American and British pre-university courses. Following this, you then enrol yourself into an undergraduate degree programme of choice. Basically one ends up picking your major from the get go, so it doesn't work like the Liberal Arts systems like in America. After the undergraduate degree, one can go on to do Post-grad programmes like Masters of PhD.

Specific to me, I did a Foundation in Arts programme for a year at HELP University followed by me joining the Bachelor of Psychology (Hons) program there. My degree program is 3 years long, after which I graduate with an BA Honours Degree.

The education system in Malaysia is quite frankly very lousy. Like many Asian countries, it's very exam based and people are obsessed with grades. It's not a very holistic education. Most people can get through with merely regurgitating what is in the text books.

That may have been too long. MY BAD. Looking forward to reading more posts!

The Canadian School System - The Ontario Edition!

First off, am I the only Canadian on this blog? I'm just really interested. :)

So in Ontario you start school ages 3-4 in Kindergarten. When I was in school this was half a day. You could either be in the morning or afternoon kind. I was lucky enough to be in the morning (which meant I got to go home and watch the Live Action Batman on the Space Station). In Kindergarten, there wasn't much to do other than play with other people your age, and learn how to properly interact with other children. After Kindergarten you go to Senior Kindergarten, where you learn your vowel, and really basic spelling. You still spend most of your time playing, but as you can guess all the toys were educational, or promoted group interaction.

After Kindergarten you move into Primary School (Grade One through Five). Not much interesting stuff happens here until you hit Grade 3 where you start learning French and have your first round of the EQAO Test. In Grade Five you get to learn all about your body and get to start learning about World History and Mythology (of course this is kind of toned down... they like to white wash stuff, make it suitable for the younger audiences). Grade Six through Eight is middle School. You have your second bought of EQAO in Grade Six.

On the EQAO, it's a standardized Government test to check if all the schools in Ontario are teaching the same thing. Your personal marks aren't effected by the tests, but your teachers are. You Graduate Junior Middle School at the end of Grade Eight and then get shipped off to High School.

I went to a public high school (I'm going to ignore the Private School Board and the Catholic School Board because I didn't have anything to do with them, so I don't have a good idea on how they work). Public High Schools can break off in different streams though, you can go to a more Tech oriented school, a more business oriented school etc. I went to two high schools, both of them didn't have specialty programs. You're in high school for 4+ years (some people chose to be there for five, which I did). You have your last EQAO Test in Grade Nine, this one only focuses on Math. In Grade 10 you have a Literacy Test, which exists to prove that you can read and write English. It's really basic, and runs on a pass and fail system.

A note on courses! You get to choose your high school courses, well some of them. You're required to take english all four years, math for three years and gym and french for one year. After that you basically have electives which you choose based on what University Program you want to go into. There are different level english and math courses (Applied and Academic for Grades 9-11 and College, Mixed, or University Level Math for Grade 12). For example, I wanted to go into English and Film Studies, the only course I required was University Level English. All my other electives I was pretty much open to take what I wished (like history, film, psych, etc) meanwhile some of my friends who wanted to go into Engineering, they had to take every different math course offered in Grades 11 and 12 (data management, calculus, linear equations etc).

So congratulations! You made it to University. I'm currently in my Undergrad at Wilfrid Laurier. It's a four year program. Since I'm double majoring I have some required courses I need to take I'll cross out the ones I've completed.:

Two First Year English Courses ie Reading Fiction, Reading Drama
Two First Year Film Courses: Film and Genre, Film and Narrative
Literary Traditions One and Two
Literary Theory
Two Film Theory Courses ie FilmTheory and Mass Media, Film and Gender Theory
Two Film History Courses
Two English Courses Pre 1600
One English Seminar
One Film Seminar

And that's the short list. After your Undergrad you can pursue Grad School (1-3 Years) Your Masters (1-2 Years) Your PHD (1-3 Years).

So there you go. My rant about the Ontario School System. I hope it wasn't too boring :)

Argentinian Educational System

Ok, this blog is doing amazing. Clearly nerdfighters are made of awesome. I'm going to try to explain briefly how the argentinian educational system works.

At the age of 3, you enter to the jardin de infantes, which is the equivalent of your kindergarten. After that, at the age of 6, you start the primaria, which takes 7 years and gives you the more basic tools for life. Then you have to decide in which kind of secundaria you want to study. There 3 types: Bachiller (general education), Perito Mercantil (specialized in economy and accounting) and Industrial (engineering). The secundaria is 5 years long.

At the age of 18, you’re able to apply for University. First you have a year of a introductory course called CBC (Ciclo Básico Común) in which you have to approve 6 signatures related to your branch of studies. Then is when you enter to the proper career.

The Universidad is divided in Facultades, each one of this specialized in a field. Each career has a different duration and system. On each career you can get three degrees, in an order of progressive importance: Licenciatura, Master and Doctorado.

Now I’m going to start speaking about the Facultad de Medicina (Medicine) in particular, the career is 7 years, after the 4^th year you start your practice at the hospitals. After that you are consider a General Doctor, then you can do a residence, in which you choose your specialization, each one has a different length. Most are between 4 and 6 years.

Education in Argentina is public, as in Austria, but with the difference that the foreigner who want to study in this country have to pay a quota. I’m in favor of free education, because I consider that being able to study is a right (as health), not a privilege. I think that everybody must be capable of studying, it doesn’t matter what is his economical or social position, which makes a more equitable society and allows social mobility.

That was my short explanation of the argentinian educational system and a little bit of my opinion on certain issues.  I’m looking forward for your articles.

Best Wishes!

Lucas

Austria's Educational System

New week, new theme! :) I told almost all of you already anyway, but I'm really happy about how this blog turns out and you are really a nice, interesting and funny bunch of guys!

I will try to give you a brief overview of our educational system, but I already have to say that I can only really tell you about my university, the Medical University of Innsbruck, and not about universities in general. And I will not try to translate the terms, because they are not equal e.g. to high school in US. So let's start, shall we?

Around the age of 3 children go to kindergarten, and I probably don't need to translate you that one, because it's a lovely Germanism in the English language. At the age of 6, children start Volksschule, which takes 4 years. Then you have two options: 1) you attend Hauptschule, which finishes after 4 years and then you start vocational training and become... a hairdresser. Or a car mechanic. That sort of jobs. Or 2) if you are smart, you go to Gymnasium. After 4 years, you again have the choice to change to vocational training or a different (often specializing) school or you stay in Gymnasium. After another 4 years, so 8 years in total, at the age of 18, you finish with a series of exams called Matura, which qualifies you for studying at a university.

Now it gets a bit tricky because as I said, university is not my field of expertise. The Universität consists of Fakultäten, which are again divided into Institute. In general there are three titles you can achieve: bachelor, master and Doktor. To be honest, I don't know anything about bachelor and master because medical universities don't have that kind of system, but since it's a standardized system for Europe, maybe somebody else can explain it :)

I can tell you more about my university and the process to become a doctor. In total it takes you 6 years to study medicine - the first 5 years are lectures and practical courses and the last year is called Klinisch-Praktisches Jahr (clinical-practical year) where you work in a hospital. You also have to write a dissertation to get your diploma. At the end you get the title Dr. med. univ., which equals MD, I believe.
Then you are a Turnusarzt in the hospital for three years, which is similar to interns like in Grey's Anatomy, you do all the shitty work and the night shifts. After those years you are a general doctor and you can either open a practice or stay in hospital and continue your eduction to Facharzt (medical specialist). That length of that eduction depends on the specialty, I think for neurosurgery it's six years.
And after that, when you are old, you are finally finished.
You can also study for an additional title, PhD, which enables you to do self-employed scientific research.

I should also mention that as a public university, we don't pay tuition fees. We used to pay about 300 Euro per semester, but that was changed a couple of years ago to have free education. Many people and political parties want free education and no access restriction. I am personally against that because in my opinion those people don't think about it, how should our country finance free education for everybody who wants to study? And it's not only for Austrians, that way we also finance the eduction for all the Germans who come here to study. It's all a big discussion ;)

I hope this was not too complicated and I'm looking forward to read your posts!