French & Italian Grade to ECTS

After I received my transcript from my first year university in France (with ECTS grade and equivalent Italian grade also provided), I want to make a correction of the French grading system conversion that I posted before. One thing that I can say for sure is (I think) the conversion depends on the university.

French grading system based on 20-point grading scale. What I heard is that you have to get at least 10 point to be considered as ‘passed’.

This table of conversion is deduced from my transcript *yep, my transcript covers quite a range ;p*, I’m not sure for grade below 10, and also the lower bound of A, which is either 16 or 17. I don’t have 16 so I can’t tell.

While Italian grading system uses 30-point grading scale. 30/30 is the highest grade; it is sometimes given “cum laude”, with honours, when performance is considered exceptional. 18/30 is the lowest passing grade. Grades from 1/30 to 17/30 are fail, and are not registered on transcripts.

I got this information from the website of university where I’m studying now. Crazy huh? ^^; When I first knew this I was like, “What the hell??”, and then started studying like crazy. I mean, imagine when I get 27 for an exam, I get the impression that I did it quite well and should be satisfied with that. But then I see the conversion table… argh, my confidence just dropped.

Anyway, in the end I don’t really care about how my transcript looks like, because IMHO transcript doesn’t really define your study quality 🙂

Cheers!