Centrale Engineers

Founded in December 1990, Le Groupe des Écoles Centrale comprises Centrale Supélec, Centrale Lyon, Centrale Nantes, Centrale Lille and Centrale Méditerranée, as well as Centrale Beijing, Centrale School of Engineering Mahindra University and Centrale Casablanca. These eight engineering schools share the same values, the same task, and the same vision of the future.

The main task of the eight institutions is to train multidisciplinary generalist engineers and PhDs capable of responding innovatively to the challenges facing our society.

 

Multi-disciplinary generalist engineers

Centrale engineers are multidisciplinary generalist engineers who have the potential to:

  • apply science and technology to help people, society, businesses, and organisations progress,
  • become leaders, entrepreneurs, innovators, and agents of change,
  • integrate technologies, and design and manage complex systems in all their dimensions

Find out here more information about the Ecole Centrale group

The skills-based approach

Within the Écoles Centrale group, the vision of the generalist Centrale engineer is fully shared to ensure the best possible positioning in the socio-economic world. The Group can look back on a history of almost 200 years, which has been enriched over the years to better meet the needs of society.

Bandeau logo du GEC
The Écoles Centrale group: our vision of generalist engineers

At the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, after a harvest of scientific discoveries and technical breakthroughs, the founders of the first Ecole Centrale wanted to train “specialist civil engineers, capable of building factories, restructuring old ones, and acting as enlightened advisors to company directors”.

We have in our DNA the ability to create / innovate, capitalise on and transform what already exists, and provide responsible advice.

Today, in the Anthropocene era, these foundations take on their full meaning. Our engineers develop the ability to project themselves and transform organisations, with a sense of ethics and responsibility fostered within all the major components of the programme, defined by the skills-based approach.

The Écoles Centrale are committed to a responsible engineering approach. Our engineers are adaptable, able to grasp the challenges of complexity from all angles in a rapidly changing world. They are trained not only to do specific jobs, but also to be able to progress. That doesn’t mean they know everything about every subject, and every student at our schools has his or her own path to follow.

All the more reason to define together what constitutes a common culture, what constitutes a benchmark and an identity, and what makes Centrale engineers.

Think in terms of 5 pillars that ensure the Centrale foundations.

While the deployment of a skills-based approach is a regulatory requirement, and a major focus of attention for the Commission des Titres d’Ingénieur (CTI) in terms of the quality of the connection between training and the needs of the professional world, its development was a lengthy process in French higher education establishments.

The Groupe des Écoles Centrale (GEC) embarked on this path more than 10 years ago, through successive iterations, enabling each school to converge towards a common reference while defining its needs in terms of its specific characteristics and environment.

Developing a skills-based approach meant defining and deploying a system for training people with the knowledge to take effective action, in line with a target defined in a reference framework.

The Reference framework: Based on job surveys and observations from all the schools, the strategic orientations of those schools, and regular exchanges of pedagogical practices, the decision was made in 2011 to collaboratively work on positioning the Centrale engineer title.

The result is a common skills reference framework with 5 macro-skills based on a core of sciences used as resources, and an approach that leaves each school free to adapt the approach to its own strengths, environment, and experience.

Through a structured and comprehensive approach centred on needs, Centrale engineers develop new products or services. They draw on a broad base of scientific and technical knowledge, as well as skills in innovation and business creation. They are able to build on the results of scientific research, which they may even have produced themselves. Whether acting as an intrapreneur, entrepreneur or researcher, the Centrale engineer uses the product life cycle to create value – be it technological, social, environmental, economic, etc. – responsibly, at every stage of the product’s development.

Centrale engineers understand, analyse, and solve complex problems using a global approach that enables them to deal with the strong interactions between disciplines, professions, and human and environmental factors They receive integrative training in fundamental sciences, engineering sciences, economic sciences, and human and social sciences, thus developing a systemic vision. Having developed great adaptability, they thrive in different environments and are mobile both across sectors and functions. They fully understand the challenges, integrate risks and impacts, accurately decipher situations, and implement the right solutions with conviction and sound reasoning.

Centrale engineers are capable of developing and managing programmes in their entirety, overseeing all phases from initial design to implementation, incorporating all required steps. Drawing on both their technical expertise and their knowledge of business issues, Centrale engineers manage all aspects of a programme, whether scientific, technical, economic, financial, human or other. They know how to guarantee results, adapt to changing environments, minimise risks and take sustainability into account.

Centrale engineers design, operate, and develop management systems, taking into account all their dimensions, whether technical, human, business or cultural. They constantly strive to optimise performance and results with an ethical and responsible approach (respect for individuals and the common good, critical thinking, and humility), aiming to leave a positive impact through their actions and management.

In order to give meaning to their actions and those of the people around them, Centrale engineers work with everyone to build a shared vision, which is translated into the deployment of a strategy. By constantly striving to give meaning through vision and strategy, they guarantee the sustainability and development of the organisations in which they work.