The Doctoral School entrance exam

• Call for projects from MIcrobeS host laboratories for the doctoral contract competition: March 2027
• Deadline for host laboratories to submit PhD project proposals: April 2027
• Publication of the projects and launch of the student application campaign: May 2027
• Student application deadline: May 2027
• Pre-selection: June 2027
• Competition dates: June 2027

• From February/March onwards, a call for PhD projects is launched among the HDR-qualified researchers affiliated with the MIcrobeS Doctoral School. They may submit their project in French or English via a platform managed by the Doctoral School administrator. The call is announced by email and on the Doctoral School website.

  Each HDR-qualified researcher may submit only one project as part of this competition. A project submitted to the competition may also be submitted to other calls for proposals (Île-de-France Region, associations, foundations, etc.), but it may not be submitted to the competition of another Doctoral School.

  In addition to the PhD project, researchers submitting a project must sign a declaration confirming their compliance with the supervision rules in force at the MIcrobeS Doctoral School. New ATIP-Avenir, G5 Pasteur, ERC or ANR Young Investigator team leaders must submit an ADT request before the competition. They must then obtain their HDR promptly in order to be able to supervise additional doctoral students.

  In April, the Doctoral School administrators verify that the HDR-qualified researchers who have submitted a project are affiliated with the Doctoral School and check their supervision capacity. The projects are then published online.

• Applications are open from the publication of the PhD projects until May, according to the competition schedule. At this stage, candidates should contact the team that submitted the project they are interested in and prepare an application file to be submitted via the Doctoral School website (Apply for a doctoral contract). Particular attention should be paid to preparing the application files so that the Doctoral School has all the information required for the evaluation process. A candidate may submit only one application for a given project.

• A dedicated day is organized to select the candidates who will be invited to the oral interviews of the competition.

  Members of the Doctoral School management committee, Master’s programme coordinators, student representatives, and the Doctoral School administrator participate in this pre-selection process.

  An academic score is assigned to each candidate based on an assessment of their application. Scores are calculated using an evaluation grid available on the Doctoral School website. This academic evaluation grid has been approved by the Doctoral School management committee and Council. As this stage takes place before the end of the academic year, the grade for the second semester of the Master’s programme is not taken into account. The thematic mobility point awarded to students who change research topic between their Master’s degree and their PhD is not awarded at this stage.

  The academic score used to calculate the ranking on the day of the competition will subsequently be updated to include the final Master’s grade and one additional point if the candidate changed research field between their Master’s degree and PhD.

The interview days take place at the end of June, according to the competition schedule. On these days, an academic panel and an interview panel are convened.

The Academic Panel

The academic panel is composed of three faculty members or researchers from the Doctoral School. Its role is to recalculate each candidate’s academic score, incorporating the second-semester Master’s grade and the thematic mobility point.

The academic score accounts for 40% of the candidate’s final score.

The Interview Panel

The interviews are conducted without the panel members being aware of the candidates’ academic scores. Each interview lasts 20 minutes: 10 minutes for the candidate to present their project, followed by 10 minutes of discussion with the panel.

The panels change each year and are representative of the diversity of the projects proposed. No person presenting a candidate for the competition, or having a candidate in their team, may sit on an interview panel.

If a candidate from the same research institute as a panel member is being interviewed, that panel member must not speak or give their opinion during the interview. Student representatives are responsible for ensuring that the interviews run smoothly and that all candidates receive equal treatment.

The ranking established by the interview panel accounts for 60% of the candidate’s final score.

Deliberations

At the end of the day, the interview panel deliberates on the candidate rankings. The interview scores are final once the deliberations have been completed.

The final score (40% academic score + 60% interview score) is then calculated using a spreadsheet specifically configured for the competition.

In the event of a tie between candidates, they will be ranked according to the following criteria, in order: highest interview score, then highest Master’s grade, then highest first-year Master’s grade, and so on.

Following the interview day, an official competition report is drawn up, indicating:

• The candidates selected for the main list, in alphabetical order;
• The candidates placed on the waiting list, in ranking order;
• Where applicable, candidates who were not ranked.

This report is sent by email to all candidates who attended the interviews.

Doctoral contracts declined by candidates on the main list are offered to candidates on the waiting list, in ranking order.

NB: A candidate who has been ranked following the competition (either on the main list but declined the contract, or on the waiting list) does not need to repeat the admission interview if they subsequently wish to enrol with another source of funding, provided that:

• The PhD project remains the same as the one presented during the competition;
• The thesis supervisor remains unchanged.