France needs to have successful foreign scholar programmes for cultural, academic, economic and political reasons.

 Cultural, since France has a long tradition of cultural diversity that is important to uphold,
 Academic, since having foreign scholar programmes is a way for French higher education and research institutions to acquire the international reputation they need for their development,
 Economic, in that our country’s future growth in international trade depends partly on good quality foreign scholar programmes today,
 Political, since foreign scholars are an important vehicle for our influence worldwide.

A government seminar held on 7 February 2005 on France’s power of attraction accepted the proposal for a quality charter for foreign scholars who are awarded French government grants, scholarships and fellowships. The 2006 government seminar subsequently adopted this text, which echoes the European Quality Charter for Mobility currently being adopted. This text replaces the existing charters produced by the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs for its excellence scholarship programmes (Eiffel and Eiffel-Doctorate programmes in particular) and concerns all training course grants, academic scholarships and high-level visiting scientist fellowships.

The quality charter hence initially concerns Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs scholars, i.e. students receiving an award from the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs pursuant to existing regulations. This charter could eventually be used as a model for a future quality charter for all inward student mobility.

The charter applies to the entire foreign scholar system: from student guidance and selection in the sending country, preparations for departure and assimilation into the chosen higher education institution right through to the return to their home country.

The charter is broken down into 74 performance and outcome indicators so that players can know where their responsibilities lie and self-assess their performance at each step, including via a cost-performance ratio, so as to gradually move towards excellence.

The charter hence lists in chronological order all the requirements that the players involved must fulfil if their joint efforts are to produce an internationally top-ranking foreign scholarsystem.

It therefore represents a cohesive set of goals, a target benchmark rather than a contract to be complied with right from the outset. Reaching these targets calls for the same close co-operation that was behind its creation, especially with the Ministry for Higher Education and Research, the conferences of higher education institutions, the French regions and towns, our network of embassies, and the agencies working under the supervision of the ministries.

On this particular point of France’s attractiveness policy, everyone works with the Government in support of a quality approach for scholars: the Embassies’ cultural sections, their university co-operation attachés and their CampusFrance offices, the French cultural institutions abroad, the higher education institutions, the public, parastatal and private agencies, and the local authorities. They constantly strive to meet the ultimate goal of compliance with all the procedures laid down in this charter.

This charter is entirely in keeping with the ‘France’s Cultural and Scientific Outreach’ and ‘Solidarity with Developing Countries’ programmes for which the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs is responsible.

Quality Charter for French Government Foreign Scholars - 2008 - (PDF, 276.7 ko)

Photographic credits:
 French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs
 PhotoAlto - éric Audras
 BananaStock

© Graphic art and layout: La Documentation Française, 2008
Updated, 2008