Franches-Montagnes District is one of the three districts of the canton of Jura, Switzerland. Its capital is the town of Saignelégier. The French-speaking district has a population of .
Municipalities
Franches-Montagnes contains a total of 13 municipalities:
The blazon of the district coat of arms is Or, a Roundel Argent bordered Sable and Coupeaux of Six Gules.
Demographics
Franches-Montagnes has a population of. Most of the population speaks French as their first language, German is the second most common and Portuguese is the third. There are 72 people who speak Italian and 4 people who speak Romansh. , the population was 49.7% male and 50.3% female. The population was made up of 4,498 Swiss men and 456 non-Swiss men. There were 4,573 Swiss women and 446 non-Swiss women. Of the population in the district, 4,147 or about 42.5% were born in Franches-Montagnes and lived there in 2000. There were 2,328 or 23.8% who were born in the same canton, while 1,840 or 18.8% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 1,031 or 10.6% were born outside of Switzerland. , there were 4,275 people who were single and never married in the district. There were 4,596 married individuals, 524 widows or widowers and 374 individuals who are divorced. There were 1,073 households that consist of only one person and 409 households with five or more people. The historical population is given in the following chart: Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray id:darkgrey value:gray ImageSize = width:1020 height:210 PlotArea = height:150 left:100 bottom:50 right:100 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:13000 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:3000 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:600 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width:40 mark: align:center bar:1850 from:start till:10210 text:"10,210" bar:1860 from:start till:11419 text:"11,419" bar:1870 from:start till:12026 text:"12,026" bar:1880 from:start till:12132 text:"12,132" bar:1888 from:start till:11997 text:"11,997" bar:1900 from:start till:11854 text:"11,854" bar:1910 from:start till:11863 text:"11,863" bar:1920 from:start till:11166 text:"11,166" bar:1930 from:start till:9974 text:"9,974" bar:1941 from:start till:9563 text:"9,563" bar:1950 from:start till:9642 text:"9,642" bar:1960 from:start till:9846 text:"9,846" bar:1970 from:start till:9336 text:"9,336" bar:1980 from:start till:8827 text:"8,827" bar:1990 from:start till:9144 text:"9,144" bar:2000 from:start till:9769 text:"9,769"
According to the, 8,649 people identified as Christian, with a confessional division of 7,068 were Roman Catholics, 1,102 Reformed and 479 adherents of other Christian confessions. 750 stated no religious adherence. 480 individuals did not answer the question. 86 people identified as Muslim, 9 as Hindu, 6 as Buddhist, and 7 âs adherents of other religious groups.
Education
In Franches-Montagnes about 3,255 or of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 785 or have completed additional higher education. Of the 785 who completed tertiary schooling, 61.9% were Swiss men, 27.3% were Swiss women, 5.4% were non-Swiss men and 5.5% were non-Swiss women. The Canton of Juraschool system provides two year of non-obligatory Kindergarten, followed by six years of Primary school. This is followed by three years of obligatory lower Secondary school where the students are separated according to ability and aptitude. Following the lower Secondary students may attend a three or four year optional upper Secondary school followed by some form of Tertiary school or they may enter an apprenticeship. During the 2009-10 school year, there were a total of 922 students attending 55 classes in Franches-Montagnes. There were 12 kindergarten classes with a total of 197 students in the district. The district had 43 primary classes and 725 students.
