In Paris, "bilingual" appears in the brochure of a free state school and in that of an American school charging €41,400 a year. In between, it can mean half the lessons taught in English, two foreign languages started at eleven, or a school where everything is in English except French. Families usually find this out when their child is about to start sixième, the first year of French middle school (Year 7 in England, 6th grade in the US). That is when the bilingual offer suddenly narrows, which is why parents search for a bilingual middle school more than a bilingual school.
Each school has its own page on this blog. This one is for sorting the options, then choosing in the right order.
Five different things behind one word
State-contracted bilingual schools. École Jeannine Manuel, the EIB and Collège Sévigné are private schools "under contract" with the French state. They follow the national curriculum and teach part of it in English: science in middle school and history-geography in the first two years at Jeannine Manuel, according to the school; around a quarter of lessons at the EIB's Monceau middle school; 7 h 55 a week in the first year of Sévigné's bilingual track, including English literature, life sciences and social studies, according to its brochure. The state contract explains their price, around €10,000 to €11,000 a year: the state pays the teachers of the French programme.
Public international sections. Balzac, Camille-Sée, Maurice-Ravel, Montaigne and a few other state schools add literature and history-geography in the section's language to the French curriculum, leading to the French international baccalaureate, the BFI. They are free. They recruit children who are already bilingual, through a written test and an interview. Their map, calendar and gaps are covered in international sections in Paris.
Bilingual schools outside the state contract. These are mostly nursery and primary schools. Lennen, in the 7th, teaches half in French and half in English, with two native-speaking teachers per class and at most fifteen pupils; it stops at age eleven and does not select on academic grounds. Being outside the contract has a consequence families discover late: according to the French government's information page on these schools, a pupil who later joins a state school "is generally required to take tests", and the new school need not follow the old one's decisions on moving up a year.
English-language schools. The International School of Paris, the American School, the British School and Marymount are not bilingual schools: everything is taught in English and French is a subject. They lead to the IB, the American diploma or A levels. They suit other families, described below.
False friends. A "section bilangue" in a state middle school simply means studying two foreign languages from the first year. A "section européenne" teaches one subject partly in English to pupils who are learning it. "Anglais renforcé" adds language hours. None of these makes a child able to follow a history lesson in English, which an international section or a bilingual track assumes.
The comparison, from official 2026-2027 fee schedules
| School | Status | Role of English | Diploma | Annual tuition 2026-2027 | Admission |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jeannine Manuel, Paris 15th | Private, state-contracted | Science in middle school, history-geography in the first two years, English on its own curriculum | BFI or IB | €11,185 middle school, €10,275 BFI upper school, €32,560 IB; €1,650 on entry | File, tests, interview; adaptation programme for non-French speakers |
| EIB, Monceau middle school and Étoile upper school, Paris 8th and 17th | State-contracted (French track), IB outside the contract | About a quarter of lessons in middle school; half-and-half primaries at Grenelle, Trocadéro, Wagram | French bac, BFI or IB | €10,200 (€11,250 in the first year); +€2,145 for the BFI; €1,300 on entry | File, with tests and interview if the school sees fit; mid-year entry possible |
| Collège Sévigné, Paris 5th | Private, state-contracted | Bilingual track: 7 h 55 a week in the first year; "Anglais+" track open to all | IGCSE then BFI | Not published on its website | English, French and maths tests for the bilingual track |
| Public international sections (Balzac, Camille-Sée, Ravel…) | State | Literature and history-geography in the section's language | BFI | Free | Education authority platform in winter, written test then interview |
| Lycée international, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, British section | State, section run by a parents' association | Same section model | BFI | €5,746 in upper school when the family pays | Language test |
| Ermitage, Maisons-Laffitte | Private, French curriculum | "French bilingual" track, alongside an English-language IB track | French bac or IB | €7,600 middle school and first upper-school year, €8,300 final two years; €900 on entry | File; boarding available |
| Lennen, Paris 7th | Private, outside the contract | Half-and-half, two teachers per class | None, ends at age 11 | Not published on its website | Meeting, no academic selection |
| International School of Paris, 16th | Independent | All in English | IB | €36,500 Grades 6-9, €39,000 Grades 10-12; €10,000 on entry | File; proof of B1 English for the last two years |
| American School of Paris, Saint-Cloud | Independent | All in English | US diploma, AP, IB | €39,965 Grades 6-8, €41,400 Grades 9-12; €12,200 capital contribution | File; siblings first, then expatriate families |
| British School of Paris, Croissy-sur-Seine | Independent | All in English | GCSE, A levels | €32,569 Years 7-9, €35,087 Years 12-13; €9,740 on entry | File, interview, English placement test |
| Marymount, Neuilly-sur-Seine | Independent | All in English, two-language track in middle school | None, ends at Grade 8 (Grade 9 opens September 2027) | €38,500 Grades 6-8; €13,800 on entry | Interview with the head |
Sources: 2026-2027 fee schedules published by Jeannine Manuel, the EIB, Ermitage, ISP, ASP, BSP and Marymount; Collège Sévigné secondary brochure 2026; Jeannine Manuel's bilingualism page; Lennen's admissions pages; Paris education authority for the sections. "On entry" adds up application, registration and capital fees paid once.
Read the table from left to right, and let the "Diploma" column guide you. Price follows legal status far more than quality. At an English-language school no teacher is paid by the state, so the family pays three to four times what a state-contracted bilingual school costs. The useful question remains which system your child will sit their final exams in.
Sixième, where everything narrows
Paris has plenty of bilingual nursery and primary schools, most of them private. At middle school only a few doors remain: Jeannine Manuel, the EIB's Monceau middle school, Sévigné, the public international sections, and the English-language schools. A family that picks a bilingual primary outside the state contract is often also signing up, without realising it, for a competitive entry at eleven, possibly with a child who will need tests to join the state system.
I advise looking at what happens after the last year of primary when you first enrol in nursery, and building the middle-school application during the year before last. Calendars differ: Jeannine Manuel closes in mid-January for families living in France, Sévigné tests from December to February, the public sections recruit through a platform from January to March, and several schools open in September. The school-by-school dates are in the Paris private school admissions calendar.
One trap specific to this market is names. The web address eab.fr, that of the former "École active bilingue", now redirects to the EIB's site, and Jeannine Manuel was long called "École active bilingue Jeannine Manuel". Families end up comparing two schools they think are different, or mixing up two that no longer have anything in common. I always have the address and status checked before anything is submitted.
Example: admissions for September 2027.
Jeannine Manuel closes applications on 12 January 2027 for families living in France, with no deadline for those moving from abroad. Lennen opened admissions for September 2027 on 2 November 2026. Marymount opens a Grade 9 class in September 2027.
Sources: school websites, consulted in October 2026.
Which child, which school
A French-speaking child with school-level English. International sections are rarely realistic: they test a language that is already in place, in writing. State-contracted bilingual schools can build it. Sévigné's Anglais+ track is open to all and lets pupils join the bilingual track at the end of the third year, on the teachers' recommendation. Jeannine Manuel is more willing than a section to take a French speaker whose English is still developing, as long as they can keep up; I compare these options in Jeannine Manuel and the bilingual and international schools, and the EIB has its own page, EIB fees and admission.
A child who is already bilingual, through a parent or years abroad. I start with the public international section, free and leading to the same BFI as the private schools, while keeping a state-contracted bilingual school in parallel, since the section's written test can rule out a child who speaks perfectly.
A child who does not speak French. It all depends on how long you stay. For a family settling for good, Jeannine Manuel's adaptation programme, from age seven to fifteen, is often the best way in, and on a Mumsnet thread from families moving to Paris, Jeannine Manuel and the EIB are the first names given by parents whose children speak no French at all, for their support programmes. For a family heading back to London or New York in two or three years, an English-language school avoids changing systems twice: ISP and Marymount for the IB or a young child, the British School for the English system, the American School for the US diploma, bearing in mind that it ranks expatriate families ahead of local ones.
Plans after school settle the remaining cases. A prépa (the French two-year course leading to the grandes écoles), Parcoursup (France's university application platform) or a French grande école point towards the BFI; a British university can be reached through A levels or the British-section BFI, as explained in English or French school in France. The English-language schools are compared in choosing an international school in Paris, and for families also weighing the great non-bilingual Paris schools, the portraits are in the best schools in Paris.
What families report
The rules of a public international section are read each year on the Paris education authority's page, not in another parent's memory: recruitment is described as open beyond Paris, and a suburban pupil competes for the same places as a Parisian one.
One thing I always have checked: a child who is "bilingual" when speaking is not necessarily bilingual in front of a long text, and many children who speak fluently write less well than they think. Sévigné's brochure says as much in its own way, explaining that its bilingual track assumes intensive English at primary school and that English there is a language of schooling, not a foreign language. Entrance tests measure just that.
The order in which I decide
First the diploma at the end of secondary school, then the child's written level in each language, measured rather than assumed. Then how long you will be in Paris. Status and price follow, and the school comes last, with two or three applications run in parallel on calendars that never line up.
At Carmine, we work with around twenty families a year on this choice: measuring the child's real level in French, English and maths, shortlisting the schools that fit, keeping the calendars and preparing the tests and interviews. Our school admissions page describes how we work.