Type | Public |
---|---|
Established | 1945 |
Director | Nathalie Loiseau |
Administrative staff
|
229 |
Undergraduates | 0 |
Postgraduates | 533 students |
Location | Strasbourg, France |
Website | www.ena.fr |
The École nationale d'administration (ENA; French pronunciation: [ekɔl nasjɔnal dadministʁasjɔ̃]; English: National School of Administration) is one of the most prestigious French grandes écoles, created in 1945 by Michel Debré to democratise access to the senior civil service. It is now entrusted with the selection and initial training of senior French officials. It is one of the most elitist French schools, both because of its acceptance rates and because a large majority of its candidates have already graduated from the best graduate schools in the country such as École Normale Supérieure, École Polytechnique or HEC Paris. The ENA thus stands as one of the symbols of the , along with the other grandes écoles, offering its alumni access to high positions in the public and private sectors.
Originally located in Paris, it has now been almost completely relocated to Strasbourg to emphasise its European character, and is now based in the former Commanderie Saint-Jean, though it continues to maintain a campus in Paris. ENA produces around 80 to 90 graduates every year, known as étudiants-fonctionnaires or "enaos" or "énarques " (IPA: [enaʁk]) for short. In 2002 the Institut international d'administration publique (IIAP) which educated foreign civil servants under a common structure with ENA was fused with it.
Access to senior position of the French civil service is threefold : first, through generalist civil service positions which ENA leads to, second, through "technical" (engineering) positions, mainly after École polytechnique, third through internal promotion.