Can we increase the social and academic mix in the education system? The impact of allocation procedures on lycée students in the paris region

Résumé En

Over the past ten years, the spread of the centralised and algorithm-based Affelnet system for the allocation of students and the introduction of greater flexibility in school choice have profoundly changed the allocation of students to senior high schools (lycées) in France. This IPP Note confirms that the procedures introduced in French education administration, through the academies (education administrative units), to manage the post-junior high school (collège) allocation of students have a determining influence on the academic and social composition of public lycées. While the social segregation of lycées (according to the socio-professional positions of parents) is generally higher in Paris than in the schools of Créteil and Versailles, the very broad catchment areas for Parisian lycées and the introduction of a specific bonus in favour of scholarship students have both contributed to increasing the social mix in public general lycées in the capital. On the other hand, the weight given to marks in the Paris allocation schedule explains why academic segregation (according to students’ final collège year marks) is much higher there than in the rest of the Île-de-France region. Within the limits imposed by geographical, social and behavioural constraints that condition their effects, the allocation procedures seem to be powerful levers for determining the social and academic mix in the education system