Veterinary education in France

Veterinary education in France is ensured by four specialised grandes écoles, the veterinary schools, located in Lyon, Maisons-Alfort, Nantes and Toulouse. The studies last at least seven years after the baccalauréat and end with an exertion thesis giving the right to the state diploma of veterinary physician.

The course starts with two years of scientific studies at the end of which students spend a national contest to enter into a veterinary school, where studies will then continue over five years.

France was the first country where the teaching of veterinary medicine has become institutionalized, through the establishment of the first veterinary schools in the eighteenth century.