CESS

Overview

The CESS (Certificat d'enseignement secondaire supérieur) is the diploma that marks the end of secondary education in Belgium's French-speaking Community, the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles (Wallonia and Brussels). It is awarded by a school's class council to a student who has completed the final year of secondary school and met the requirements in every subject of that year. Holding the CESS is generally required to enrol in higher education in Belgium's French Community, at a university or at a "haute école".

Who can apply

Most CESS holders are students finishing year 6 of secondary school (or, in some professional streams, year 7), typically around age 17 to 18, in one of several sections: general, technical or artistic transition, technical or artistic qualification, or professional. The CESS can also be reached outside a normal school career: adults who did not complete this path at the usual age can work towards it through evening courses under "enseignement de promotion sociale", or by passing the examinations of the Jury central, a board set up by the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles for candidates who were home-schooled, interrupted their studies, or otherwise did not follow a standard secondary path.

Exam pattern

Belgium's French Community does not hold a single national exit exam for the CESS. The diploma is built mainly from each school's own continuous assessment: subject teachers grade a student's work across the final year, and the class council decides at year end whether every subject's requirements have been met.

Since the 2010-2011 school year, the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles has added a mandatory external certifying evaluation ("épreuve externe certificative") in the final year, currently in French for all sections, and in History for students in the general and in the technical/artistic transition sections. This is separate from the CE1D ("Certificat d'études du premier degré"), which certifies the end of the first two years of secondary school and is not a CESS exam.

Candidates taking the Jury central route do not attend classes; they sit written and oral examinations covering the programme of the final years of the section they present, since the Jury central only examines and does not teach.

Marking and results

On the external certifying evaluation, a student who scores at least 50% is treated as having mastered the competencies tested in that subject, and the result feeds into the student's average for that subject. The CESS itself is a pass/fail outcome of the class council's review of the full year's work: a student who satisfies every subject's requirements for their section and year is awarded the CESS. There is no overall numeric grade or class of honours attached to the certificate.

After the exam

The CESS gives access to higher education in Belgium's French Community: holders can enrol at a university or a haute école without submitting a competitive application file or personal statement. A small number of programmes, such as some medicine, dentistry and engineering courses, add their own entrance examination on top of the CESS. Students without a CESS can still reach higher education through other recognised routes, such as an equivalent diploma from "promotion sociale" or a university admission exam, but these sit outside the CESS itself.

Preparation tips

Because most of the CESS depends on a full year's coursework rather than one sitting, steady performance across the final year's subjects matters more than exam-day technique. For the external French and History evaluation, the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles publishes past papers that are useful for practice. Candidates preparing through the Jury central should get the official programme for their section directly from the Jury, since no classes are taught and the examination follows that syllabus closely.