High school organizations called on Friday to continue the mobilization after a meeting with the Minister of National Education Édouard Geffray, for lack of “concrete measures”. During the day, 735 schools were disrupted, according to the government.

Published on: 02/10/2026 - 07:41 Modified on: 02/10/2026 - 22:16

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New day of demonstrations. More than a week after the start of the social protest led by high school students, 735 schools were disrupted on Friday October 2. High school organizations have called for the mobilization to continue next Tuesday, due to a lack of “concrete measures” proposed by the Minister of Education.

Édouard Geffray announced, after meeting them, the upcoming launch of an “action plan” to “accelerate the replacement” of teachers, particularly in first and final year classes. He plans, regarding school schedules, to also undertake “in-depth work”, while recognizing that he would “not be able to make a decision for the start of the 2027 school year”.

The High School Union (USL) reacted by calling "to continue the mobilization (...) and to join the Act III movement on Tuesday", a day of major national demonstration, according to Ryad Rani, the president of this student union. A large national education union called for participation, “including through a strike”.

Started on September 17, the protest movement ignited on Thursday in many cities in France and continued on Friday with "735 establishments" disrupted, or "30% less than yesterday", pointed out Édouard Geffray.

Read alsoHigh school mobilization: faced with excesses, maintaining order in question

“Overall, we have (...) had less violence against staff, since today three people were unfortunately injured compared to 31 yesterday,” he added.

There were 1,747 arrests on Friday alone, more than 5,000 since Monday, linked to the high school blockades, Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez also indicated on TF1 on Friday evening.

In La Ciotat (Bouches-du-Rhône) in particular, "a teacher was intentionally doused with gasoline, then physically attacked by two individuals", according to the authorities.

James, a second-year student in Lille, deplored "the extremely violent police repression which inevitably fuels the anger of high school students." “Because when we see our comrades being beaten, strangled, gouged out, gassed in all directions, while we are just trying to be able to have a dialogue with the government, it inevitably makes us angry.”

Violence and degradation

Clashes between young people and the police have been noted in several cities, notably in Paris and Strasbourg, where the police intervened on a university campus at the request of the university president.

In Belfort, a police officer was violently beaten by “rioters”, according to Laurent Nuñez.

“This morning, our high school was supposed to be open but young people who are not from high school came just to set the fire,” testified Eliott, 16, a first grader in an establishment in La Rochelle.

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“The goal is to make peaceful movements to make ourselves heard and these thugs are doing us a complete disservice by burning our high schools,” also regrets Maëlle, a student at the Bordeaux François-Mauriac high school, damaged by a fire on Thursday.

Nearly 400 high schools (out of 3,700 in the country) remained closed. The Mandela high school in Nantes, whose entrance hall was destroyed the day before by a fire, will keep its doors closed until the All Saints' Day holidays.

Many establishments have tried to provide distance learning. At the Don Bosco private high school in Nice, the implementation of distance learning courses was quite chaotic, according to a student's parent speaking on condition of anonymity: "Some teachers gave up because their planned face-to-face course was difficult to adapt at the last minute."

Damage estimated at several million euros

On Thursday, “1,027 establishments” had “been affected by the movement” according to the Ministry of the Interior, which recorded nearly 2,000 arrests.

The first police detentions led, in the courts, to the first sentences to community service.

The Minister of Justice, Gérald Darmanin, also asked prosecutors to hold parents civilly liable in the event of damage caused by their children in order to make them “pay the reparations”.

The damage to high schools will cost several million euros, according to estimates from the Île-de-France, Grand Est, Hauts-de-France and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes regions.

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Seven months before the presidential election, in an electric social and political climate, this mobilization is more than sensitive.

According to the Prime Minister's services, the movement would be a "maneuver organized by LFI and its ultra-left proxies". The coordinator of La France insoumise Manuel Bompard criticized Matignon for “sinking into conspiracy”.

Among the students who also joined the mobilization this week, Kyziah Maurin-Sene, 18, in the first year of art history in Strasbourg. For her, “this movement of anger is political but it is the youth who are political in themselves”. “It wasn’t the left who told us, ‘Go demonstrate!’”

With AFP

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