Sat, 20 March 2010
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France is taking a second look at education prospects for its black and Arab minorities that would allow them to rise to the top.PARIS - By her own admission, Houria Khemissi was an exception at her high school in a drab Paris suburb.
While her friends agonised over final exams, she cruised through the written tests and set her sights higher.
So when a teacher suggested she apply to one of France's ivy league schools, Khemissi jumped at the chance, certain that a degree from the Paris Institute of Political Studies - or Sciences-Po as it is known - would be her ticket to success.
"At my school, the goal was getting a high school diploma," said Khemissi, a smiling, confident 21-year-old who grew up in the grim housing estates of La Courneuve, north of Paris.
"It's not easy to be far-sighted when you live in the suburbs. But I just didn't see myself going to work after high school."
For decades, Sciences-Po has been the seedbed for France's elite, counting among its alumni President Nicolas Sarkozy, his predecessor Jacques Chirac, several cabinet ministers and a host of executives from leading companies.
Tucked away on a side street on Paris' Left Bank, Sciences-Po has also for the past eight years pried open the door to France's overwhelmingly white establishment by taking in students from the high-immigrant suburbs.
The focus of much attention after the suburbs exploded in rioting in 2005, the equal opportunities programme at the prestigious Paris school is once again at the forefront of debate following Barack Obama's rise to the White House.
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