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Since late September, a wave of protests has swept through high schools across France, with students blockading campuses and taking to the streets to denounce what they describe as chronic underfunding in education. The unrest, which has spread to hundreds of lycées—schools serving students aged 15 to 18—has occasionally turned violent, leaving hundreds of students, teachers, and police officers injured. Thousands of people have been arrested, including an unspecified number of individuals from outside the school communities who authorities suspect of stirring trouble.
The demonstrators’ core grievances center on staff shortages and deteriorating facilities. Madalena, a student in Paris, told the BBC that teachers are sometimes absent for weeks without replacements. She also described her school buildings as “boiling hot” during recent heat waves, underscoring the physical discomfort students endure. Beyond these complaints, some pupils are frustrated by bans on mobile phones and school days that stretch until 18:00. “You get home at 7 pm, and have no time to sleep or do your homework,” one lycéen told France 2, highlighting the exhausting daily routine.
Another flashpoint is Parcoursup, France’s online platform that assigns places in higher education. Many students view the system as opaque and stress-inducing. The frustration has deep structural roots: roughly 80% of each age cohort now passes the baccalauréat, the national school-leaving exam, which guarantees a university place—though not necessarily in a desired program. This fuels fierce competition for sought-after courses and amplifies anxiety around Parcoursup, which many regard as a flawed gatekeeper.
These grievances are genuine, but do they alone explain the scale and intensity of the protests? According to a recent report by the OECD, a club of developed nations, the French government actually spends more per lycée student than the EU average for upper-secondary schools. Teacher shortages are acute, yet by OECD measures they are milder than elsewhere—fewer posts go unfilled—although French teachers receive relatively low pay. The long school day, while a genuine burden, stems largely from extended lunch breaks and complex timetables rather than efforts to compensate for shorter holidays, which are not especially long compared with other EU countries.
The extended school day has long been a fact of French life and can hardly account for the current eruption. Nor can the pressures of a dysfunctional higher-education system alone. In most European countries, 80-90% of young people complete secondary education, and competition for good university places creates stress elsewhere too. While underfunding, dilapidated buildings, and fears about the future are real drivers of discontent, they do not by themselves explain why the movement has become “unprecedented” in terms of the number of schools, pupils, and the degree of violence involved, according to Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez.
The scale of the protests is all the more remarkable given the risks participants take. Blockading a school or university by threats or force is illegal, and it draws in police as well as casseurs—vandals who infiltrate demonstrations. Pupils have found themselves caught up in police crowd-control operations that are often heavy-handed. Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu has insisted that security forces are not under orders to “confront high-school students,” only to enforce the law. About 500 people were arrested during Tuesday’s unrest alone, a stark indicator of the tension on the ground.
To understand the pupils’ tactics, one must look beyond the barricaded school gates to a deep-rooted political tradition. In France, power has often resided on the street as much as in elected bodies. Students are keenly aware of this history. In October 1990, a rape at a school in Seine-Saint-Denis—an area north of Paris that has been a focus for the present unrest—triggered mass rallies against underfunding and staff shortages. The movement resulted in the government releasing the equivalent of €1.2bn (£1bn) in today’s money for lycées.
Similarly, in October 1998, 500,000 pupils marched across France over comparable demands, winning almost €1bn to renovate schools and 14,000 extra staff. On several occasions, student protests have defeated government reforms—such as a university overhaul in 1986 and a lower youth minimum wage in 1994. Probably the most striking display of student power came in 2006, when a law designed to loosen hire-and-fire rules for those under 26 was withdrawn after weeks of blockades in universities and lycées, often marred by violence. The measure had been passed by parliament and signed by then-President Jacques Chirac, yet it was scrapped in the face of sustained protest.
French adults have also shown how blockading roads can prevail over elected officials. The gilets jaunes (yellow vests) uprising of 2018-2019, which saw shops ransacked and government buildings attacked across the country, led the government to drop a rise in fuel taxes and approve €10bn in spending. However, the street does not always win. In 1968—a heroic precedent cited by every French protest movement—a student uprising was ultimately brought to an end by election. Yet the lycéens are heirs to a political culture in which demonstrators compete with elected officials to be seen as the true voice of the people.
This historical context helps explain why the current movement has resonated so powerfully. The students are not merely reacting to inadequate facilities or overstretched staff; they are invoking a centuries-old tradition of street politics that has repeatedly forced French governments to retreat. Their blockades, however risky, are calculated acts of civil disobedience rooted in the belief that mass mobilization can succeed where institutional channels have failed. As the protests continue, the government faces a familiar dilemma: concede to demands and risk setting a precedent, or stand firm and risk further escalation. For now, the barricades remain, and the anger shows no sign of subsiding.
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