Luxembourg

Students are required to attend secondary school for at least three years after completing six years of primary education. This covers the years when a student is twelve to fifteen years of age. There are two secondary education tracks available for vocational education and a separate track for university entrance. The régime préparatoire is designed to provide a broader qualification for young people interested in a technical secondary education who are academically weak, but could become eligible for further training at a technical secondary school or vocational training center. The second track is Technical Secondary Education offered at fifteen schools called lycée techniques, in specialized programs of study that include hotel catering and management and agriculture. The first stage (cycle inférieur) lasts three years and completes the mandatory state requirement of three years of secondary education. The curriculum includes languages, mathematics, natural sciences, human sciences, artistic, and musical and physical education. Qualified graduates of the technical secondary education can pursue additional postsecondary education at intermediate and upper stages in either a vocational section offering an apprenticeship, technician's training, or a technical section.

At the apprenticeship vocational section students study one program from among agriculture, arts and crafts, commerce, tourism and hotel catering, industry, and domestic sciences. Training at this level is a partnership between the school and a business with the student workweek divided between an on-the-job apprenticeship while simultaneously learning theoretical principles in the classroom. This program of study can last from two to four years with graduates earning a Certificat d'Initiation Technique et Professionnelle (CITP). The Technician Training Program is designed to educate students for highly skilled jobs in industry and it may also last from two to four years. Graduates receive a diplome de technicien (technical degree at the end of the secondary education program), which grants either a professional career or entrance into higher education. Programs of study include administration and commerce, agriculture, electronics, mechanics, art and crafts, chemistry, building science, hotel catering and tourism, and computer science. The Technical Section lasts four years and graduates earn a technical secondary completion diploma. This course of study centers on theoretical and general subjects. Graduates can either enter a university or are qualified for entry into the job market in the fields of administration, commerce and business management, ancillary medical and social studies, or general technology. Enrolled students in Secondary Technical Schools are more than double the number of students in college preparatory programs. For the academic years 1998-1999, 20,763 students were enrolled at 21 Secondary Technical Schools ethnically distributed among Luxembourgers (63.3 percent), Portuguese (22.8 percent), Italians (4.1 percent), French (1.5 percent), Belgians (0.8 percent), Germans (0.8 percent), Yugoslavians (0.4 percent), and the remaining 4.4 percent distributed among other nationalities. Three Catholic private schools and four non-Catholic private schools enrolled 2,742 students in 1998-1999.

General Secondary Education was reorganized in 1968 by lycées (general secondary schools) and is for students planning to attend a university. The lower stage covers three years of education and completes the state requirement for secondary education. There is an upper stage divided into two, two-year segments. The first year is called the classe d'orientation, which allows students to adjust to secondary education environment. At the end of the first year students must select from either the classical education program that mandates Latin as a third language or the modern education program with English as the third language. The basic program is the same and a year later students in the classical program must also learn English. At the upper stage students must again select from two programs of study, literary or scientific. Mathematical difficulty is the primary distinction between the two programs. Specialization comes in the final two years and includes two optional courses of study in either languages and human sciences, human and social sciences, fine arts and crafts, music for the literary program and mathematics and physics, natural sciences and mathematics, or economics and mathematics for the scientific orientation. Graduates earn the diplome de fin d'études secondaires (high school diploma) and are qualified for university entrance provided they pass the final examination. Students enrolled in nine General Secondary Schools and three schools exclusively for the lower stages of General Secondary Education with college-based curricula totaled 9,471 students of whom 87.4 percent were Luxembourgers, 4.5 percent Portuguese, 1.7 percent Italian, 1.2 percent Belgian, 1.2 percent German, 1.1 percent French, 0.4 percent Yugoslavian, and the remaining 2.6 percent were distributed among other nationalities. The number of students enrolled in two private Catholic General Secondary Schools earning a degree leading to a university education was 2,948.