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Qualification procedure

The "qualification" procedure is a prerequisite to apply for any university position in France. Once obtained, the qualification is valid for four years for
applications at (almost) all higher-educational institutions in France, in
a given field. It exists at two levels

  • Maître de Conférences ( faculty) : generally requires a Ph.D. (and the Ph.D. exam should have taken place by 19th December 2007).
  • Professeur (senior faculty) : generally requires a habilitation thesis (this entitles the candidate to supervise research, and for candidates from countries other than France equivalent degrees or experience that prove they are able to supervise research work and PhD students are usually considered acceptable).

To apply for the qualification, candidates must fill out some
electronic forms at the href="http://www.education.gouv.fr/personnel/enseignant_superieur/enseignant_chercheur/antares.htm">
Antares
web pages

FROM September 11, 2007
TO October 16th, 2007, 5pm (Paris Time)


indicating their contact
details and the level and academic field for which they wish to be
qualified, including a brief description of the Ph.D., teaching
experience, research interests, and administrative
responsibilities held so far (see href="#forms">below).

During November, candidates will then be
allocated two referees (rapporteurs). The names and contact details of the
referees will be sent to the candidates by post starting from the 23th of
November ; they will also be placed on the
Antares
web pages.

Since the time allocated to send the dossier to the referee will be
fairly short, it is advisable to check Antares for their names immediately
after November 23rd rather than wait for a written communication which
might arrive closer to the deadline.

The candidate should then send a number of documents, including
Ph.D. or habilitation certificate, a CV, and copies of the
Ph.D. or habilitation thesis and examiners’ report and a
selection of papers (see below for
details) to the referees at the latest by
the 19th of December
2007 (as indicated by the postmark).

color="red">The official calendar
should be consulted for a confirmation of all the above
deadlines.

Candidates will be informed of the results of the qualification at
the end of February.

Help with the Antares forms (deadline : 5:00 pm, 16th October 2007)

Most of the Antares system should be self-explanatory (university
positions include teaching of first to last year university
courses, so candidates should be comfortable in their use of
French), and a certain amount of on-line help is provided.

However the following information may help with some of the more
technical and legalistic aspects of the forms.

After launching Antares (by clicking on "Demarrer Antares") and
following the link for new candidates, you will be taken to a form
for entering your personal details. Note that :

  • "Nom patronymique" just means family name (maiden name where applicable).
  • "Numen" is only needed for those who already have a permanent position in a French educational institution.
  • In the section for "Informations complémentaires", those currently on a postdoc should fill out only the section labelled "Stage post-doctoral" (the other options are relevant for certain short term contracts in France). The

    "Dernière année universitaire du contrat" is for
    example 2002 for a contract that runs from from autumn 2001 to autumn
    2003.

  • The password (and numerical ID obtained after validating the form) will be needed at several stages, including the actual job application (i.e. after qualification), so keep them somewhere safe !
  • Details on the form (in particular your address) may not be modified after the 16th October deadline, so make sure that suitable forwardings have been set up if necessary.

Once you have validated your personal details you will be given
an identification number to be kept somewhere safe, together with your
password (see above). You should then specify (this too by 5:00pm, 16th
October 2007) the classes of positions for which you are requesting a
qualification : follow "Candidatures qualification", then "Créer
une nouvelle candidature" and enter

  • "MCF" (i.e. Maître de Conférences) as the Corps ;
  • "29" (i.e. Constituants élémentaires) as the Section. For applying to other positions in other academic specialisations, you can consult a table of section numbers.

After clicking on "Visualisez les libellés" to ensure that the
codes and numbers really correspond to what you want, validate the
form and you will be taken to a form asking you for
brief details relating to your PhD or Habilitation thesis (and funding),
teaching, research interests, and administrative activities.

  • To the question "Deposez vous cette candidature en vertu de votre situation d’enseignant associe a temps plein ou de votre activite professionnelle (Decret 84-431 du 6 juin 1984 modifié article 23 2° ,3° , 4° et 5° pour les candidatures MCF ou article 44 2° 3° 4°

    et 5° pour les candidatures PR.) ?" the reply is "Non"
    as long
    as you have passed your Ph.D. exam (for other cases see the
    detailed references below) !

  • At the entry "Mention" you should indicate the grade awarded for the Ph.D. or habilitation (if your Ph.D./habilitation institution does not award grades for the Ph.D./habilitation state so explicitly).

Once you have validated this (last !) form, you are registered as
a candidate. You can change any of this information if you need to until
the deadline. You should receive official confirmation of your
candidature(s) by post shortly after validating the form for the first
time, but you’ll then still be able to modify it until the
October 16th deadline.

If you wish, you can repeat the above procedure and also apply for a
"Qualification" for a professor position (PR) (though it is not needed
for this position). The deadlines and the
procedure
are the same, but the requirements are of course different.
If you are working in the french academic system
you must have either a "doctorat d’état" or have or be in
the process of obtaining a "Habilitation". If you studied and
work abroad you should choose The third possibility
("Diplômes...CNU"). The CNU is the Conseil National des
Université. It is a national body and is solely responsible for
deciding wether or not your diplomas and situation entitles you to an
equivalence with the "Habilitation". If their decision is
negative, you will not be entitled to pursue your application for the
position advertized by the University. You would of course be informed of
that at a later time.

Material to be sent to the referees (deadline : December 19th, 2007)

The items to be sent to the referees are listed in detail in
paragraph 4 of the

Arrêté
du 27 juin 2007, and will be specified also in the
letter sent to
candidates to inform them of the selection of referees.
For most candidates the relevant items should be :

  1. A photocopy of some form of proof of identification bearing a photo (e.g. identity card, passport).
  2. A document certifying that the candidate has obtained their Ph.D and/or habilitation. For candidates who do not have a habilitation and who do not already hold a long-term position in France, the habilitation requirement may be waived. The waiver should be requested by including a "demande de dispense d’habilitation" as part of the application.
  3. A CV including all the information provided on the Antares electronic forms and in addition a more detailed description of the candidate’s teaching activities, research, supervision of graduate students, and any other administrative and academic tasks undertaken.
  4. Copies of up to three of the candidate’s works (e.g. articles).
  5. A copy of the Ph.D./Habilitation examiners’ report, where available. Otherwise candidates should provide a declaration from the head of the relevant institution, indicating the reasons why the examiners’ report is not available.

When the documents are in a language other than French, the
referees may request that they be accompanied by versions
translated into French. They may also explicitly request copies of
the candidate’s publications/works mentioned in the CV but not
initially sent to the referees.

The referee might wish to contact you directly (perhaps by phone), to
verify details of your CV, and perhaps also to get an idea about your
command of the french language, if French is not your mother tongue. Such
contacts are perfectly normal, so do not hesitate to write a phone number
at which you can be reached (and definitely an e-mail address !) in your
CV, or provide it to the referee by e-mail in case he asks for it. On the
other hand, do not worry if your referee is happy with the material you
sent over and does not contact you.

Further information

While every effort has been made to ensure that the above
information is correct, it is not guaranteed to be so, nor is it
exhaustive (e.g. many special cases and alternative procedures
have been left out). For full details you should refer to the
official texts, in particular :

Also potentially of help are

  • The information page provided by the Conseil National des Universités
  • its PDF document relating to section 29, which is of particular interest.