France Ups Its "Excellence Initiative" University Groups to Eight. (February 6, 2012)

Last July the French government chose Bordeaux, Strasbourg, and Paris Sciences et Lettres as the first three winners in the Initiative d'Excellence (Idex) stakes to receive large funding boosts in order to bring the universities making up the conglomerates (clusters) into the international academic top echelon. Now -- as the French presidential election scheduled for 22 April and 6 May if a run off is necessary -- approaches the government has announced five more Idex conglomerates of universities and other institutes to bring the total to eight.

The new groups:  Aix-Marseille, Paris-Saclay, Sorbonne Université, Sorbonne Paris Cité, and Toulouse.

This French group of eight are to get a total €7.7 billion (A$9.4 billion), and according to ScienceInsider, "some or all of the partners in each conglomerate will eventually merge into big research universities that can rival those elsewhere in Europe and the United States".

The Higher Education and Research Ministry issued a statement stating that the four criteria used in judgement were: excellence in research, training and capacity to innovate, national and international partnerships, and management ability to implement the plan. Nevertheless there has been criticism; biochemist Patrick Monfort, the general secretary of SNCS-FSU, a French research union told ScienceInsider: "We have always been against the principle of competition among institutions and individuals. The government has tripped over its own feet."

However, Edouard Husson, vice-chancellor of the universities of Paris, told Times Higher Education that establishing a hierarchy of universities was vital to competing on the international stage. "Regional universities will be very successful in certain fields and will be important in terms of improving students' employability," he said. "But our hope is that there will be four comprehensive universities in Paris and at least two will be very competitive."