I feel like it's worth pointing out here, for Americans who don't know better (no blame implied), that the French have one of the best mathematical pipelines in the world. They have almost as many Nobels (13 vs. 11) despite having 1/5 the population. Guardian article about them here:
So please don't think France is a backwater that just doesn't know how to do math - on the contrary, it may be the best country in the world to be born into, if you want to be a mathematician.
For what it's worth, I'm an American who honestly is pretty bad at math, but I try to keep learning, though I'm past an age where it will matter in college or higher education.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/may/31/europa-french-...
So please don't think France is a backwater that just doesn't know how to do math - on the contrary, it may be the best country in the world to be born into, if you want to be a mathematician.
For what it's worth, I'm an American who honestly is pretty bad at math, but I try to keep learning, though I'm past an age where it will matter in college or higher education.