About ENSAE

ENSAE ParisTech
École Nationale de la Statistique et de l’Administration Économique

The “École Nationale de la Statistique et de l’Administration Économique” (ENSAE) is one of the leading French graduate schools in the fields of statistics, economics, finance and actuarial science.

ENSAE is a founding member of the Paris Institute of Technology (ParisTech), together with some of France’s most prestigious graduate schools of engineering (the so-called “Grandes écoles”). ENSAE is deeply related to the Center for Research in Economics and Statistics (CREST), one of France’s leading research centers in the fields of economics, statistics and finance. More recently, ENSAE became a founding member of the Paris-Saclay University. University partnerships extend to all fields of excellence of ENSAE-CREST: economics, statistics, insurance and finance.

ENSAE’s faculty includes some of the country’s foremost specialists in their fields. Most lecturers at ENSAE are full-time professors or researchers, but many are professionals working in large public or private corporations.

About a hundred and fifty students graduate each year from ENSAE, after completing a program comparable to the first year of study for a North-American Ph.D. or a top-level North-American Master’s Degree in Economics or Statistics. Two thirds of ENSAE graduates join banks or insurance companies. Many of the others obtain academic positions or work as consultants or auditors. Over fifty percents of ENSAE graduates work in the field of finance.

The academic background of ENSAE students is extremely large. Some of them are admitted through a competitive examination after two or three years in the post-secondary school preparatory programmes (the so-called “classes préparatoires”). Others are graduates of the top French graduate schools such as Ecole Normale Supérieure, Ecole Polytechnique and other Grandes Ecoles. Others are university graduates in either economics or mathematics.

ENSAE also welcomes foreign students who have graduated from top graduate schools of comparable standards in their own countries. Depending on their background and on their needs, these students can be admitted either into the first or into the second year of the mainstream three-year engineering program, or into the fifteen-month graduate program “Mastère Spécialisé” in Actuarial Science, Data Science, Quantitative Finance or Applied Economics.

PhD students who have passed their qualifying examinations can join the CREST to work on their dissertation.

Key Figures

  • ENSAE was created 75 years ago
  • Admission through 4 competitive examinations & on the basis of academic qualification   
  • Doubles degree programs with some of France’s most prestigious Grandes Écoles
  • 3 year curriculum in the engineering program leading to the grade of Master (“Diplôme d’ingénieur”)
  • 5 specialization tracks in third year : Actuarial science, Business Analytics, Data Science, Finance a risk management, Forecasting & economic policy
  • 450 students over the 3 year program
  • Average raw earnings in the first job : 49 200 €
  • 4 Post Graduate specialization programs : Actuarial science,  Data Science, Quantitative methods for economic & financial decision, Finance & risk management
  • 5 research masters operated within the University Paris-Saclay : Master in Economics, Master Data Science, Master Statistics & Finance, Master Statistics & Machine Learning, Master Quantitative Sociology  & Demography
  • 6 500 Alumni
  • 1 junior enterprise, France’s best junior enterprise in 2018
  • Founder member of ParisTech & University Paris-Saclay

A grande école in Paris

Higher education in France is provided by two types of institutions: universities and “grandes écoles”.

The university curriculum begins directly after a student receives his/her secondary school diploma (the “Baccalauréat”). The first three years of study lead to the delivery of a Licence degree, the fourth and fifth years to the degree of Master. Completing a research oriented Master is a prerequisite to continue in a doctoral program.

By contrast, degree courses in a “grande école” cover three years of study. A student only enters a grande école after at least two years of intensive study in a “classe préparatoire”, beginning just after her/his Baccalauréat. Selection for entry to a grande école is based on the results of highly competitive national examinations, consisting of both written papers and orals, which candidates take two or more years after obtaining the Baccalauréat.

Upon completion of their studies in a “grande école”, students have reached a BAC + 5 standard, which is equivalent to that of an English or American student who has completed the first year of preparation for a PhD.

Although the French system of higher education remains dual, some connections have been established over the years between “grandes écoles” and universities: universities admit students who do not succeed in the competitive examination for admission to a “grande école”. Conversely, most “grandes écoles” now accept a limited number of university graduates provided that their academic records are excellent. Every year, for example, about 20 students who have completed outstanding “maîtrises” (first year of master) in mathematics, mathematics applied to social science, economics, or econometrics, are admitted to ENSAE. “Grandes écoles” students may also enrol in a university.

Third year ENSAE students are encouraged to prepare a Research Master in a university with which ENSAE has a formal agreement, so as to obtain the prerequisite for continued enrolment in a doctoral programme.