Learn Hardcore French: Après l’enseignement secondaire, beaucoup d’étudiants vont à l’université ou en école professionnelle. - After secondary education, many students go to the university or to a vocational school.

After adverbs of quantity (like beaucoup, peu, trop, assez, moins, etc.), French normally uses de + noun, without any article:

beaucoup de monde – a lot of people
trop de travail – too much work
assez d’argent – enough money

So the basic pattern is:

beaucoup de + noun

Before a vowel sound, de becomes d’:

beaucoup d’étudiants

beaucoup de les étudiants is simply ungrammatical; de + le contracts to du, but you still wouldn’t use it after beaucoup in this general sense.

beaucoup des étudiants does exist, but it means many of the students, referring to a specific, previously mentioned group:

Beaucoup d’étudiants vont à l’université.
→ Many students (in general) go to university.
Beaucoup des étudiants de cette classe vont à l’université.
→ Many of the students in this class go to university.

In your sentence, the idea is general, so beaucoup d’étudiants is correct.

Why is it vont à l’université but en école professionnelle? Why do the prepositions change?

You’re seeing two common patterns:

à + definite article + place
This is the most standard way to say “go to” a place:
- aller à l’université – to go to (the) university
- aller à l’école – to go to school
- aller au cinéma – to go to the cinema
So vont à l’université is the straightforward, expected structure.
en + type of school/program
With certain types of institutions or forms of schooling, French often uses en to mean “in (the system of) / in (a program of)” rather than physically going to a particular building:
- être en école d’ingénieurs – to be in an engineering school program
- entrer en école de commerce – to enter a business school
- passer en seconde – to move into 10th grade (first year of lycée)
So aller en école professionnelle is a bit like saying go into vocational school / go into vocational education, emphasizing the type of education rather than a specific institution.

You could also hear aller à l’école professionnelle, but:

à l’école professionnelle → more concrete, a particular school
en école professionnelle → more about the kind of studies (vocational track vs. university track)

That contrast between a concrete physical institution (à) and a type of education/program (en) is the main nuance here.

Can I say à l’école professionnelle instead of en école professionnelle? Would it change the meaning?

Yes, aller à l’école professionnelle is grammatically correct, but there’s a slight difference in emphasis:

aller en école professionnelle
- Focus on the educational path / type of studies
- Suggests “go into vocational education” as a track, not just a building
aller à l’école professionnelle
- More concrete: “go to the vocational school (building/institution)”
- Could be used about a particular, identified school in the conversation

In many everyday contexts, people might use either and be understood without any problem, but en école professionnelle feels a bit more like talking about the system or track, not just the place.

Why is it en école professionnelle and not dans une école professionnelle?

Both are possible, but they don’t say quite the same thing:

en école professionnelle
- Typical structure for “being in” a type of schooling/program
- Emphasis on a status: being in vocational education, as a school pathway
- Similar to en maternelle, en primaire, en sixième
dans une école professionnelle
- More literal: physically inside a specific vocational school
- Emphasis on location

In your sentence, the contrast is between going to university and going into vocational school (as a track), so en école professionnelle fits better.

Why is it après l’enseignement secondaire and not après le enseignement secondaire?

This is about elision in French.

le enseignement would put two vowels together: le (ending in a vowel sound) + enseignement (starting with a vowel)
In that case, le becomes l’ to avoid the awkward contact of vowels:
- l’enseignement (masculine singular)

So we have:

après le lycée (consonant → no elision)
après l’école (vowel → elision)
après l’enseignement secondaire (vowel → elision)

le enseignement is never correct; you must write l’enseignement.

Could we say après le lycée instead of après l’enseignement secondaire? Is there a difference?

Yes, and in many everyday contexts, après le lycée will sound more natural and specific, especially in France.

l’enseignement secondaire
- More general / formal term
- Refers to the whole of secondary education (middle + high school: collège + lycée in France)
- Sounds a bit more institutional or textbook-like
le lycée
- Specifically high school (roughly ages 15–18 in France)
- Everyday word people actually use in conversation

So:

Après le lycée, beaucoup d’étudiants vont à l’université...
→ After high school, many students go to university...
Après l’enseignement secondaire...
→ After secondary education... (slightly more formal, and not limited to the lycée years)

Why is enseignement used here instead of éducation? Aren’t they both “education”?

They overlap in meaning, but they’re not used in the same way:

l’enseignement
- Literally: “teaching / instruction”
- Often refers to the school system or level of schooling:
  - enseignement primaire – primary education
  - enseignement secondaire – secondary education
  - enseignement supérieur – higher education
l’éducation
- Broader: upbringing, the way someone is brought up, manners, as well as education in general
- éducation nationale is the official term for the French Ministry/Department of Education

Using l’enseignement secondaire clearly points to the secondary school system / level, not just “education” in a vague sense. l’éducation secondaire would sound unusual or off in French for this institutional meaning.

Why is it professionnelle with -elle, not professionnel?

professionnel / professionnelle is an adjective that agrees with the noun it describes:

un étudiant professionnel – masculine singular
une école professionnelle – feminine singular
des écoles professionnelles – feminine plural

Here, école is feminine, so the adjective takes the feminine form:

école → feminine
professionnelle → feminine singular to match

Hence: en école professionnelle.

Why is it vont (present tense) and not something like iront (future) if we’re talking about what happens after secondary school?

French often uses the present tense to state general truths, habits, or tendencies, even when they are logically placed in the future relative to some point in time.

So:

Après l’enseignement secondaire, beaucoup d’étudiants vont à l’université.
→ Describes a typical pattern: what generally happens in this situation.

Using iront would make it sound more like a prediction about a specific group of students you’re talking about now:

Après l’enseignement secondaire, beaucoup de ces étudiants iront à l’université.
→ After finishing secondary school, many of these students will go to university.

In your sentence, the idea is a general fact, so the present vont is the right choice.

Is l’université here a specific university, or universities in general?

In French, using la / l’ with a singular noun can often refer to the institution in general, not a particular building or specific university:

aller à l’université – to go to university (as an institution/type of study)
être à l’école – to be at school
travailler à l’hôpital – to work in a hospital / in the hospital system

In your sentence, à l’université is clearly generic: it means to university (higher education), not one specific university identified earlier.

If you wanted a particular one, you’d usually specify:

aller à l’université de Lyon
aller à l’Université de Paris (proper name, capital U)

What exactly does enseignement secondaire cover in the French system?

In the French context:

enseignement primaire – primary school (roughly ages 6–11)
enseignement secondaire – secondary education, which includes:
- collège (middle school, about 11–15)
- lycée (high school, about 15–18)

So l’enseignement secondaire is the whole block from the start of middle school up to the end of high school. Your sentence is speaking about what happens after finishing that entire phase.

Are there any important liaisons or pronunciation points in this sentence?

Key pronunciation points:

Après l’enseignement
- No liaison between Après and l’; you just say après [a‑prɛ] then l’enseignement [l‿ɑ̃sɛɲmə̃].
beaucoup d’étudiants
- beaucoup is pronounced [bo‑ku], the final p is silent.
- There is a liaison between beaucoup and d’: [bo‑ku‿dety‑djɑ̃].
  You’ll hear a [k] sound linking: beau-cou_d’étudiants.
vont à l’université
- No liaison between vont and à in standard speech: [vɔ̃‿ta lynivɛʁsite] (the t belongs to vont, but you don’t pronounce an extra [t] sound).
en école
- en is nasal: [ɑ̃]. Then [ekɔl] for école.
- No liaison between en and école.

Working on these liaisons will help your French sound more natural and fluent.