Higher education: Frédérique Vidal announces the creation of 19,000 additional places

On Europe 1, the Minister of Higher Education Frédérique Vidal announces the creation of 19,000 additional places in higher education: 5,000 for BTS and 14,000 in universities or other sectors in tension. 

INTERVIEW

The main admission phase of ParcourSup, the higher education assignment platform, ends in a few days, on July 16.

Some 635,000 high school students are registered this year on this portal, to which can be added students in reorientation, resuming studies and applicants educated abroad.

Each year, this selection phase arouses the anguish of the students, but also a strong disappointment when they find themselves without assignment, for lack of places.

To compensate for this lack, Frédérique Vidal, Minister of Higher Education, announces the creation of 19,000 additional places in sectors in tension in Europe 1.

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5,000 places for BTS

"We have been adding places in higher education every year for four years. I had already added 15,000 at the start of the year when I saw future baccalaureate holders coming and 19,000 more will be opened this summer: 5,000 for BTS and 14,000 in universities, IFSI etc. In total nearly 34,000 additional places will be created this year. " 

As of Thursday, the Ministers of Higher Education Frédérique Vidal and National Education Jean-Michel Blanquer announced the creation of 5,000 additional places in BTS from the next school year, in order to "meet the needs of high school graduates".

ParcourSup in the face of criticism

The ParcourSup platform arouses many criticisms: opaque choice criteria, unexplained refusals despite good academic results and the impact of the Covid-19 epidemic, which disrupted the school year, the grades and the assessments of teachers. "The procedure works extremely well, better than last year again," defends the minister, who takes stock of the progress. "As we speak, even before the results of the baccalaureate, more than 94% of general baccalaureate holders have a proposal and more than 9 out of ten baccalaureate holders in general."

"Post-bac admission [old platform, editor's note] drew lots, but ParcourSup is an orientation project that is built thanks to the main teachers, to the high schools," she says.

"This is exactly the principle of meritocracy: there are known expectations, the files are examined." 

From July 16, a complementary personalized phase will come into effect for students who are still unassigned.

In 2020, at the end of the procedure, eight out of ten baccalauréat holders received at least one admission proposal at the end of the main phase, and nine out of ten at the end of the complementary phase.