The #ENSos hashtag has trended on Twitter. For good reason, the Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENS) in Lyon has just canceled the French composition test of its very selective competition – some 4,400 candidates for around a hundred places – due to the loss of copies.
“An envelope of copies of the French composition test, which took place on April 13, did not reach the admissions and competitive examinations department of the ENS de Lyon, after being sent by a writing center on April 17 April,” the school said in a statement Thursday. The replacement test will take place on Saturday May 13, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., according to a message sent to the candidates.
After a week of fruitless research, the event canceled
According to the establishment, “the carrier declared having deposited them at the ENS de Lyon on April 21, without formal proof of receipt. Since then, the ENS de Lyon has deployed all the means to find these copies, also calling on the service provider mandated by the sending center”. “After a week of fruitless research, the ENS de Lyon resolved to declare these copies definitively lost. On May 2, (…) the decision was taken to cancel the event and to organize a replacement event”.
On Twitter, from many candidates denounce this situation, pointing out, for example, “the disrespect for the candidates” and the “amateurism” of the school. Other Internet users have shown creative to express their displeasure.
A first cancellation of a topic after a topic was “erroneously” disclosed
The candidates concerned are, for the most part, from a literary preparatory class and have spent at least two years studying for this competition.
The ENS Lyon competition had already been disrupted this year, with the postponement of the geography specialty test for ten days “due to the mistaken disclosure of the subject of the geographical map commentary test in a center of ‘written,’ the school said in April.