We had tonight the first meeting of the Advisory Board of EPITECH, a French Computer Science school, sister company of one of EPITA, the engineering school I attended over 10 years ago.
EPITECH had an interesting approch: it aims to create vocational training, exclusively on IT, in a 5 year program. There is a very strong focus on hands-on learning, with 140 projects to be completed by every student in the course of the 5 years program. As early as the 3rd year, students are requested to work part-time at corporations, and complete 2 full 6-month internships as well.
From what I saw tonight, the ambiton is pretty impressive for a school created only 5 years ago. Last promotion saw 135 students receive their degree, with 100% of them finding a job in less than 3 month (75% get hired before graduation). Average salary is near 32K€ at graduation time.
I am joined at this Board by about 12 people, from Apple, Wanadoo, Nagra, Sophos, Accor, etc. It should be very interesting and I am honoured to contribute to the steering of the learning of these young graduates. I'll update this post with pictures shortly.
