facilities, student housing, dining and hospitality services, and a range of sports facilities dedicated to the 4,600 people who live on campus. The nearest regional train station is Lozère (line B, zone 4 of the RER network). Several buses also connect École Polytechnique to the Massy-Palaiseau RER station and Massy TGV station. The campus is close to other scientific institutions in Saclay (Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives), Orsay (Université Paris-Sud) and Bures (Institut des hautes études scientifiques and some laboratories of the Centre national de la recherche scientifique). Organization and administration Specific status The École Polytechnique is an institution of higher learning under the supervision of the French Ministry of Defence, through the General Directorate for Armament (administratively speaking, it is a national public establishment of an administrative character). It has a dual status, being an engineering school that trains civilian engineers and scientists, but also officers for the three French armies. The aim is to provide the French state with a scientific and technical elite. The training of civil servants and officers has weakened since 1950: today, only 10 to 20% of the school's students join the ranks of the administration or the army (while 20% go into research and the rest into engineering or management). It is headed by a general officer (since 2012, by a General engineer of Armament, whereas previous directors were generally army generals), and employs military personnel in leadership, administrative and sport training positions. French undergraduate polytechniciens, both male and female, are cadets and have to go through a period of military training before beginning their studies. However, the military dimension of the school faded over time, with a reduced period of preliminary military training, and fewer and fewer students choosing a career as an officer. On special occasions, such as the military parade on the Champs-Élysées on Bastille Day, the wear the 19th-century-style grand uniform, with the bicorne, or cocked hat, but students no longer wear uniforms on campus since the abolition of the 'internal uniform' in the mid-1980s. Students also wear the grand uniform for special events on campus, such as large lectures, ceremonies or important lessons. Activities and teaching staff École Polytechnique has a general engineering curriculum at the undergraduate and graduate levels, as well as a doctoral school. In addition to the faculty coming from its local laboratories, it employs many researchers and professors from other institutions,