Our overall policy is to actively pursue the three ongoing goals we have been assigned: Pre-professional training leading to a diploma five years after the baccalauréat, Continuing education courses to facilitate career options, and production-oriented Research.

The latest four-year contract between the Education Ministry and our school covers the years 2006-2009.

After assessing the main social and economic changes taking place today (partly linked to the impact of digital technologies and changes in the content of the audio-visual professions, leading to the deployment of a spectrum of training courses that is broad both in terms of its themes and its localities), we put in place a medium-term development policy for the period in question. Its main thrust is to continue the work begun in 2002: our assessment of the situation and the avenues for development we identified have shown themselves to be relevant to present needs - to borrow from European Community jargon, they have turned out to be ‘robust'.

Given the changes taking place in the professional environment and which continue to impact on graduate placement, ENS Louis-Lumière must continue to adapt its syllabus in order to maximize the value of its key assets: its status as a grande école, its close links to the audio-visual professions, the quality of its students, and the strengths of its teaching.

Our credo can be summed up as follows:

- Striving for excellence in teaching in whatever way possible, in order to optimize our position among existing educational courses.

- Optimizing graduate placement, adjusting our educational approach to respond to industry demands.

- Seizing new opportunities, interpreting and embracing economic, technical and artistic changes in the arts-related industries as well as the demands of education and research policy in a European and international environment.

- Excellence in teaching can be achieved via the relevance of our educational programme and our ability to attract and/or keep top-flight academic and professional talent;
the competitive entrance exam must remain a strong and accurate reflection of our entry requirements, also indicating the strength of our commitment to the students who are selected.

- Optimizing graduate placement means increasing the involvement of industry in defining our educational programme and continuing to develop the apprenticeship system, which remains a healthy feature of the audio-visual professions. In general terms, we will reinforce and diversify opportunities for sharing experience between the school's students and staff and representatives of the industries we train for.

- Seizing new opportunities involves promoting creativity and research and sharing skills; it also entails playing a key cultural role at national, European and international level. Continuing education strategies will be strongly developed. This ongoing development plan involves a number of projects, some carrying on work that has already begun, others reflecting ideas previously put on hold for reasons of resources or timing.

Our strategy comprises five broad avenues for development:

- The new education plan will continue to maintain the highest standards thanks to a policy of innovation specially tailored to the needs of the school and its environment.

- Research and production will be promoted and made into a key distinctive feature by which the school's specific know-how can be recognized.

- Joint production of sound and vision projects is becoming a key feature given the increasing internationalization of the school, clearly reflecting its ability to keep abreast of changes in the industry. Our partnership policy, particularly at European level, will play an essential role.

- The High Definition Digital Platform (D-Cinéma) will play an important part in structuring our technical resources for both sound and vision. It will make it possible to improve the conditions in which teaching, research and production take place.

- Organizing the school's living memory (i.e. its archives) is a major job that cannot be delayed any longer. It will take place in the broader framework of a reassessment of the role of audio-visual archives within the information-based economy of the 21st century.

- Updating our technical platform.
 

Jacques Arlandis
Director
ENS Louis-Lumière