It was all good fun rioting, but now France's écoliers must pay the price for their riot holidays. Are the police looking into their vandalisms and assaults? Are they being sued for damages? No, no, no. They are being tested on their slack preparation for the bac.*

TRUTH OR HAPPINESS? FRENCH STUDENTS MUST CHOOSE

PARIS June 12, 2006 (AFP) - Hundreds of thousands of French school students crammed into exam halls Monday for the start of the feared 'baccalauréat', with as every year the philosophy paper offering the first stomach-churning challenge.

Preparation for the 'bac' was disrupted in April by the nationwide student protests against the French government's proposed new jobs contract for under 26 year-olds, which was eventually abandoned.

And how will this generation of French junior philosophes fare?

SARTRE LEAVES FRANCE'S YOUNG THINKERS PUZZLED

PARIS June 13, 2006 (Telegraph) - Hundreds of thousands of French teenagers sat the first of this year's Baccalauréat examinations yesterday amid fears that their performance would confirm their country's decline as a nation of philosophers.

Although the French education system takes philosophy much more seriously than its counterparts in neighbouring countries, devoting up to eight hours a week to the subject, academics are alarmed at persistently low marks in recent years.

[P]resent-day teachers report average results among pupils taking the technical Baccalauréat of only seven-and-a-half out of 20 [37.5%], rising to between eight and eight-and-a-half [42.5%] when all candidates are included.

Government officials say the marks reflect the extension of Baccalauréat studies to 85 per cent of secondary school children. One philosophy teacher told Libération newspaper: "Among my 32 students, only three really follow." He said he had more success when he departed from "concrete themes" and used football analogies to help explain theories.

And once the bac hurdle has been jumped or knocked over France's budding scholars can look forward to enrollment in a prestigious middling French university. Bonne chance, jeunes érudits !

* The French bac or baccalauréat is a series of entry exams for university roughly equivalent to the British A-levels and American SATs.

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