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Comment by pstch | Hacker News Reader

The rules on this are a bit complicated, though : officially, this price does not apply to anyone who has worked more than two years since their last diploma. Persons in this situation may have to pay thousands of euros (1k/2k per year) to go to a public university. In most cases, the price is covered by some institution (such as "Pole Emploi", which handles unemployment) or by some professional reconversion organization.

Note that many universities don't follow these rules at all, and will let you sign up (paying the normal price) even if you worked more than two years since your last diploma.

I don't really know how it works for foreigners, and many people (including social workers and advisers) are confused by this.

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I found the tuition fees on campusfrance, which is the official website for foreign students who wants to go into the French higher education system. They actually state: "The difference is that in France, whether you are French or foreign, the State pays most of the cost."

I also know some foreign students in French universities, who went doing masters or PhD and they pay the same as a French student. I doubt it is different for bachelor degrees.

This article from Le Monde implies that they charge foreigners the same price as French students: https://www.lemonde.fr/education/article/2014/11/26/faire-pa...

I think that you speak about "formation continue" in your first paragraph. I think that if you register of your own, you actually get the normal fees. It is only if you qualify for "formation continue" which is more restrictive than being out of school for 2 years. It seems that it means you are funded by Pôle Emploi, or a company etc (see here: https://www.univ-paris8.fr/Formation-continue). So someone who is jobless but not registered as jobless in PôleEmploi can do"formation initiale". Also: https://information-documentation.fr/scolarite/regimes-et-mo... For sure, it does not seem to be very clear.

Yes, I was referring to "formation continue". It is true that if you register of your own, you always get to "formation initiale". However, most sources on Internet state that "formation initiale" is only for persons that "have not studied or did not stop their studies in the last two years".

Both my pedagogical (from the university) counseler and the one from Pôle Emploi told me that I was not eligibile to "formation initiale", and that I could only continue studying in "formation continue", since I had already studied, and worked for more than two years. Many people told me the same.

Luckily, I did not listen to them, and still registered, successfully.

I think that many persons (including myself & many public education workers) have a poor understanding of this (admittedly unclear) part of the education code. From my understanding, everyone is eligible to "formation initiale", while some people in a specific situation are eligible to "formation continue", which has been misunderstood as meaning that people that are in this situation are also not eligible to "formation initiale".

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