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The École Normale Supérieure (also known as Normale Sup', Normale, ENS, ENS-Ulm or Ulm) is an elite French grande école, whose main campus is located around the rue d'Ulm ( Ulm Street) in the 5th arrondissement of Paris.Originally meant to train high school teachers through the agrégation, it is now an elite institution training researchers, university professors, and civil servants (as well as highschool teachers, in particular in the humanities). It focuses on training through research, with an emphasis on freedom of curriculum.
Its alumni include eight laureates of the Fields Medal, which is the equivalent of the Nobel Prize for the mathematical sciences, as well as Nobel Prize winners in both science and literature.
Apart from the École Normale Supérieure in Paris, three other écoles normales supérieures have been established, with similar goals:
The normaliens, as the students of the several ENS are known, keep a level of excellence in the various disciplines in which they are trained. Normaliens from France and other European Union countries are considered civil servants in training, and as such paid a monthly salary, in exchange for an agreement to serve France for 10 years, including those of studies. This exclusivity clause is seldom applied, though.
Apart from the normaliens, ENS also welcomes selected foreign students ("international selection"), who receive a stipend , as well as, selected students from neighbouring universities, to follow the same curriculum. It also participates in various graduate programs and has extensive research laboratories.
The fictitious mathematician Nicolas Bourbaki's "association of collaborators" is based at ENS.
1 Famous alumni
(Non-exhaustive list.)
- Sciences
- Louis Pasteur
- Nobel Prize holders
- Pierre-Gilles de GennesPierre-Gilles de Gennes (born October 24, 1932) is a French physicist and Nobel laureate. He was born in Paris, France and was home-schooled to the age of 12. Later, Gennes studied at the Ecole Normale Superieure''. After leaving the cole in 1955, he beca
- Claude Cohen-TannoudjiClaude Cohen-Tannoudji (born April 1, 1933) is a French physicist working at the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris, France, where he has also studied physics. Cohen-Tannoudji was born in Constantine, Algeria. He is one of most outstanding researchers in t
- Fields Medal holders (all French holders of the Fields medal were educated at the École Normale Supérieure)
- André WeilAndre Weil ( May 6, 1906 August 6, 1998) was one of the great mathematicians of the 20th century, a founding member of the influential Bourbaki group. He was brother of the philosopher Simone Weil. Born in Paris, he studied in Paris, Rome and Gottingen an
- Laurent SchwartzLaurent Schwartz ( 5 March 1915 4 July 2002) was a French mathematician. He was born in Paris. After studying at the Ecole Normale Superieure, he got his doctorate from the Faculty of Sciences in Strasbourg. Among other teaching positions, he taught at Ec
- Jean-Pierre SerreJean-Pierre Serre (born September 15, 1926) is one of the leading mathematicians of the twentieth century, active in algebraic geometry, number theory and topology. He was educated at the Lycee de Nimes and then from 1945 to 1948 at the Ecole Normale Supe
- René ThomRene Thom ( September 2, 1923 October 25, 2002) was a French mathematician and founder of the catastrophe theory. He received the Fields Medal in 1958. Biography Rene Thom was born in Montbeliard, France. He was educated at Lycee Saint-Louis and Ecole Nor
- Alain Connes
- Pierre-Louis Lions
- Jean-Christophe Yoccoz
- Laurent Lafforgue
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