If you have ever wondered what communist Russia was like, you should visit the University of Paris VII Jussieu. Imagine hulking, government-financed buildings in the architectural style of what people in the '60s thought the future would look like. Imagine a "quad" consisting of a vast plain of concrete and cigarette butts, devoid of any trees or grass. Imagine hallways that look like subway stations and smell curiously like horse stables.
Good thing my class there had to be relocated - because of a pesky asbestos problem that was shutting down part of the school. But the University of Paris I was only marginally better. The same bad socialist architecture was there, but it was marginally cleaner and smelled only faintly of urine.
On the first day of class, I arrived extra early to be sure I was on time. Good thing I did, because finding "salle 30" proved to be less than easy. You'd think that any lucid person would number the rooms in a building in a logical sequence, such as classroom 5 being just before classroom 6, and so on. Apparently the French bureaucracy finds rational numerical sequencing too pass?©, as there was no apparent pattern to their numbering.
At one point, I stumbled upon room 29, and stupidly hoping for its natural partner room 30, I found room 29B, and then directly after, for no good reason, room 35.
After crisscrossing the labyrinthine corridors several more times, I found room 30, which was nowhere near room 29. Quickly taking a seat, I waited patiently for my first ever class in a real French university. Unfortunately, that time never came.
After 40 minutes of waiting for the professor, another student who had checked with the main office told us that the class actually did not begin for another week. The only indication that this was true: a scribbled, handwritten note in the hallway that no one ever saw. No e-mail, just a scribbled note. I couldn't believe this was 2007.
Returning the following week, I was a little surprised to actually see the professor, an elderly man in a smoking jacket. Sadly, although I could see him, I could hardly hear him. French students are possibly the rudest pupils on the planet.
I'm not kidding when I say that a majority of the class carried on high-decibel, blatant conversation during the entire three-hour period. I could understand a little furtive whispering and note passing, but not obvious, unabashed chatting and laughter. And the professor just carried on, lecturing as if he didn't hear it. The only attempt he made to quiet the class was to snap his fingers once, at which people audibly snickered and continued their banter.
I felt incredibly awkward and almost physically ill as a witness to this barefaced disrespect, not to mention frustrated that I couldn't comprehend any of the lecture. Anyone who behaved this way in an American university would be asked to leave. Talking to one of the only studious students who sat near the front after class, I asked her if it was always like this. She told me yes, and that what I had witnessed was even a little tame, comparatively speaking. People apparently learn not from lecture but by frantically doing absurd amounts of reading at home.
I guess I shouldn't have expected much from the French university system, seeing as it is basically free. The government pays for nearly all the tuition of any student who passes the Bac, an intense entrance exam taken at the end of high school. The student I spoke with pays only around 250 Euros per year for her education.
Yet what seems to be the redeeming feature of their system is actually at the root of the problem. Sure, we balk at the $40,000 that a year at Tufts costs, but look at the benefits. At least we have a plainly attractive campus, a semblance of campus life, professors who (for the most part) genuinely care about their subjects and their students, and students who actually seem interested enough in learning to shut up for an hour.
Without sounding like an economics major, where there are no incentives, people lack the motivation to act. The professors here must not be paid very well, judging from the quality of instruction.
It seems that, since French students do not have to pay for a pricey education, they don't have the same kind of motivation to learn or do well. And with facilities and conditions as outdated and as unpleasant as theirs, it is no wonder there is no school pride or campus life.
Call me a gluttonous capitalist, but for all its faults, I'll take the overpriced, elitist and ranking-obsessed American university system any day. The French do a lot of things right, but college isn't one of them.
-Adam Winograd is a junior majoring in international relations. He can be reached at Adam.Winograd@tufts.edu.
