French-American Higher Education Summit-Paris 2008

The French-American Foundation is the principal non-governmental organization linking France and the United States at leadership levels and across the full range of the French-American relationship.

The purpose of the French-American Foundation is to strengthen the French-American relationship as a vital component of the trans-Atlantic partnership.

This mission is accomplished through a variety of initiatives that include multi-year policy programs, conferences on issues of French-American interest, and leadership and professional exchanges of decision-makers from France and the United States.

Founded in 1976, the Foundation is an operating organization that relies on outside financial support to carry out its mission and does not provide grants. It is an independent, non-partisan, non-profit organization with 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status.

Source: The French-American Foundation at http://www.frenchamerican.org/

Gary Lavergne Represents American Higher Education During French-American Foundation Series of Meetings in Paris

On April 14, 2008, the French Ministry of Higher Education, hosted a conference exploring equity and access to France’s premier colleges and universities. Two American researchers, Saul Geiser of the University of California-Berkeley, and Gary Lavergne from the University of Texas, met with leading French scholars to compare plans for increasing the college-going rates of traditionally under-represented populations. Other participants included members of the President Nicolas Sárközy’s senior staff from the Elysée Palace, Prime Minister François Fillon’s senior staff from Matignon, as well as senior policy staff from the Ministry of Higher Education and Research and from the Ministry of Education.

During the evening of April 14, 2008, the Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris, often called “Sciences Po,” convened a group of social science and educational researchers for a discussion of the role of educational institutions and policy in the formation of social, economic, and political leaders.

Pictured Above are Gary Lavergne of the University of Texas and Saul Geiser of UC-Berkeley

Presenters during a symposium at Lycée Henri IV included (l-r) Nicholas Dungan, President of the French American Foundation, Ioanna Kohler, Saul Geiser, Gary Lavergne, and Patrice Corre, the Principal of Lycée Henri IV.

On April 15, 2008, Patrice Corre, the principal of Lycée Henri IV (widely considered the most prestigious high school in France), Ioanna Kohler, the Program Director of the French-American Foundation housed at New York University, and Daniel Sabbagh, a Senior Research Fellow of Sciences Po, hosted a roundtable discussion on the literature on college-going rates and social mobility. The audience for this event include French high school principals, administrators of the "grandes écoles," teachers, and graduate students.

The issues raised in these meetings are as old as education itself: how can public education facilitate the success of first-generation entering college students from poor and minority families?

For more information on the French study group that investigated issues of access and equity, see: http://www.frenchamerican.org/cms/files/annualreports/2006%20Annual%20Report.pdf