Green light for final year students who wish to continue their studies in higher education: registrations on Parcoursup begin this Wednesday.
Kick-off for Parcoursup. From this Wednesday, final year pupils and students who wish to reorient themselves can register and begin to express their wishes on the higher education orientation platform.
Clearly, candidates can formulate up to ten wishes without necessarily ranking them in order of preference. In addition, it is also possible to indicate up to ten additional wishes for apprenticeship training – almost 10,000.
Please note, if registration on Parcoursup is not compulsory, you must be sure and certain of your project outside Parcoursup before giving up registering, warns the platform in its frequently asked questions. Last day to formulate or modify your wishes: March 13 at 11:59 p.m. (Paris time). After this date, no new wishes can be added or replaced.
• Wishes and sub-wishes
If it is possible to formulate up to ten wishes for selective training (BTS, CPGE, BUT, schools, IEP/sciences Po, IFSI, EFTS, paramedical training, selective licenses, veterinary schools) or non-selective training (licensees, including “health access” licenses, and specific health access course – PASS), for certain training courses, it is also possible to make special wishes.
This allows you to apply to several establishments for the same training. Concretely: the training is counted as a single wish and the establishments chosen from those offering the training correspond to sub-wishes.
These are the BTS and BUT, the DN MADE, the DCG (accounting and management diploma), the prep classes (CPGE), the EFTS (social work training establishments) and the DNA (national art diploma). The number of sub-wishes is limited to ten per wish, with a limit of 20 sub-wishes in total. The candidate file clearly indicates the number of wishes and sub-wishes chosen.
For the IFSI (Nursing Training Institutes) and the speech therapy, orthoptics and hearing aid institutes grouped at the territorial level, the engineering and business/management schools which recruit through a common competitive examination, the Sciences Po/IEP Paris and the Sciences Po/IEP network (Aix, Lille, Lyon, Rennes, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Strasbourg and Toulouse), the specific “health access” courses (PASS) in Île-de-France and the joint competition of national veterinary schools, the number of submissions is not limited.
• Choice of training
It is possible to only express wishes in selective training courses but these training courses may refuse the application. This is why Parcoursup advises avoiding this type of choice and diversifying your wishes between selective and non-selective training.
To help candidates in their choice of training, a map of Parcoursup training courses is available here. Each training course is presented with the content of the courses, any tuition fees, the dates of the open days but also the criteria for examining applications, the application procedures or even the figures for access to training and professional opportunities.
Namely: each formation is only informed of the wishes which concern it, it is therefore not aware of the other wishes that the candidate formulates.
• Complete your file
Candidates can finalize their file with the elements requested by the training courses until April 2 (11:59 p.m.). They must also confirm their training wishes, a mandatory step. To confirm the wishes, the file must be completed with all the requested elements. “Only confirmed wishes are examined by the training,” recalls the platform.
If it is recommended to take your time to formulate your wishes (no advantage is granted to those who make them quickly), you should also not wait until the last moment to complete your file and gradually prepare the necessary elements to confirm the wishes.
Reminder: for apprenticeship training, it is still possible to make wishes after April 2.
• Sections not to be overlooked
The “my activities and interests” section is intended to highlight the professional and personal experiences of candidates as well as their extracurricular skills. “This section is optional but it is a real plus for your file: it allows you to stand out, to talk more about yourself and to highlight qualities or experiences, commitments that are specific to you and which do not appear in the bulletins schools”, advises Parcoursup.
The candidate can thus mention the internships carried out, SNU or associative commitments, Bafa, first aid training or Cordée for success. But do not forget that for all the titles and certificates mentioned, you must be able to produce proof.
Do not neglect the cover letter when training requires it. “It’s about explaining, in a few lines, what motivates you,” says the platform. “This letter is all the more relevant because it provides information about you, your choices and your motivation. It is a personal expression that is expected of you and not a theoretical essay.”
• “Yes” or “yes-if” answers
The first admission responses begin to fall from June 2. Candidates thus receive “yes” or “yes-if” answers gradually and continuously.
Please note, it is imperative to respond to each admission offer within the deadline indicated. If an applicant does not respond to an admission proposal within the deadline, the proposal is lost and is sent to another applicant.
The “yes-if” answer means that the candidate is accepted into the training provided they follow a course adapted to their profile (refresher training, support, tutoring). “This course is offered to you because the training considers that you need to consolidate or strengthen certain skills necessary to follow and succeed in the training”, indicates Parcoursup. Last year, some 26,000 students were enrolled in this type of course.
During the written baccalaureate exams (i.e. from June 16 to 19 for the general and technological routes, June 26 for the professional route), the deadlines for responding to admission offers are suspended.
Each time a candidate renounces one or more proposals, he frees up places which are offered to other candidates. Every day, new proposals are made.
• “Waiting list” response
The answer “on the waiting list” means that the number of places available and the ranking rank in the training do not allow an admission offer to be made to the candidate.
In front of each pending wish, it is possible to consult its position in the waiting list, the total number of candidates in the waiting list, the number of places in the training but also its position in the ranking of the training or the position in the ranking of the last candidate who received an admission offer last year.
If a candidate only receives “pending” responses, the wishes are automatically maintained. Don't panic: there is a good chance that the position on the waiting list will change as places become available.
Furthermore, it is entirely possible to keep wishes on the waiting list if a candidate accepts an admission offer until the end of the main admission phase, that is to say the July 10 included.
This is one of the new features this year: from June 6 and until June 10, it will be possible to classify the pending wishes that the candidate wishes to keep in order of preference. Only wishes ranked in order of preference before June 10 inclusive are maintained. Please note, the others will be deleted.
• Examination of applications
It is not Parcoursup nor an algorithm that examines applications, specifies the platform. They are teachers of higher education courses. “They set up wish examination committees which analyze the applications in April-May.” Each training therefore transmits its ranking to Parcoursup after analyzing the files.
• What to do without an admission offer?
If a candidate does not receive any admission offer, it is possible to formulate new wishes during the complementary phase which begins on June 11.
In addition, from July 1, in each academy, a commission led by the rector (access to higher education commission) will examine the situation of candidates who have contacted it and without an admission offer in order to “offer them training that is as close as possible to their initial choices.”
“The CAES will study your file and will be able to rely on the information you have provided in the 'preference and other projects' section to help you.” This is why it is important to complete this section correctly, warns the platform.
