École supérieure de commerce
An École Supérieure de Commerce or ESC is a French business school at the university level.
In most instances, such a school is a private Grande École de Commerce operated by a local chamber of commerce and industry, also abbreviated as Sup de Co'. Grande Écoles de Commerce are traditionally known for producing many, if not most, of the leading French business executives and government officials.
The Grandes Écoles of France are higher education establishments outside the mainstream framework of the public universities system. Unlike French public universities which have an obligation to accept all candidates of the same region who hold a baccalauréat, the selection criteria of grandes écoles rests mainly on competitive written and oral exams, usually undertaken by students from dedicated preparatory classes, although this is not always the case. They do not have a large student body and are generally focused on a single subject area, such as business or engineering.
Most of the French business schools have the term ESC in their name such as ESCP Europe. Some French business schools do not include the term ESC in the school name e.g. Skema Business School, ICN Business School, HEC Paris, EM Lyon, Grenoble École de Management and Audencia. Some schools use an adapted version of ESC e.g. ESSEC or Skema Business School.
