The share of students entering the X from preparatory classes outside Paris has collapsed in 25 years.
You probably knew that the "Big 6" prépas (Louis-le-Grand, Ginette, Henri IV, Stanislas, Saint-Louis and Hoche) were heavily overrepresented at École polytechnique, but perhaps not how far this has gone in recent years. In 1995, one in two French polytechniciens from the M track, the forerunner of today's MP (maths and physics), had done their prépa outside Paris. In 2021, it was barely more than one in six (17%). The PC track (physics and chemistry, formerly P) tells the same story: the share of students from outside Paris fell from 41% in 1995 to just 13% (!!) in 2021.
Looking at the candidates who registered for the exam and those finally admitted, the shares from outside Paris used to be comparable. The two curves have kept drifting apart since. In practice, students preparing outside Paris now fail more often. Two hypotheses could explain this:
Paris preparatory classes are getting better and better at preparing their students for the X exam;
or, more likely, the best high school graduates from outside Paris are flocking to Paris prépas.
Michel Gonin, former director of the admissions exam, told Le Monde in 2017 that "the number of high school graduates from outside Paris remains stable: around 50%".
If the trend holds, access to the X will concentrate on an ever shorter list of preparatory classes, pushing the big lycées outside Paris further to the margins (Le Parc, the Lazos and Fermat being the exceptions). The systematic use of APB and then Parcoursup since 2008 may be partly responsible, since it encourages students from the regions to try their luck at the big Paris lycées. Is a two-speed, or even three-speed, system here to stay, with a core of powerful Paris prépas, a few large provincial lycées in decline and the rest already out of the race?
