A grande école () is a specialised university that is separate from, but parallel and often connected to, the main framework of the French public university system. The grandes écoles offer teaching, research and professional training in single academic fields such as engineering, architecture, business administration, academic research, or public policy and administration. The schools only admit students through an extremely competitive examination process; a significant proportion of their graduates occupy senior positions in French business, academia, civil service and civil society. Grandes écoles primarily admit students based on their national ranking in competitive written and oral exams called concours, which are organised annually by the French central government. While anyone can register for concours, successful candidates have almost always completed two or three years of dedicated preparatory classes (classes préparatoires) prior to admission. Most grandes écoles are publicly funded and therefore have limited tuition costs. Some grandes écoles, especially business schools (Écoles de Commerce) are organised privately, and therefore have more costly tuitions. Classification of grandes écoles Origins The term grande école originated in 1794 after the French Revolution, when the National Convention created the École normale supérieure, the mathematician Gaspard Monge and Lazare Carnot created the École centrale des travaux publics (later École polytechnique), and the abbot Henri Grégoire created the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers. The model was probably the military academy at Mézières, of which Monge was an alumnus. The system of competitive entry was used as a means to open up higher education to more candidates based on merit. Some schools included in the category have roots in the 17th and 18th centuries and are older than the term grande école, which dates to 1794. Their forerunners were schools aimed at graduating civil servants, such as technical officers (Ecole d'Arts et Métiers, renamed Arts et Métiers ParisTech, established in 1780), mine supervisors (École des mines de Paris established in 1783), bridge and road engineers (École royale des ponts et chaussées established in 1747), and shipbuilding engineers (École des ingénieurs-constructeurs des vaisseaux royaux established in 1741). Five military engineering academies and graduate schools of artillery were established in the 17th century in France, such as the école de l'artillerie de Douai (established in 1697) and the later école du génie de Mézières (established in 1748), wherein mathematics, chemistry and sciences were already a major part of the curriculum taught by first-rank scientists such as Pierre-Simon