French Students Plan More Protests Despite Government Measures

French high school students, who intensified their protests this week against understaffed institutions and overcrowding, are planning yet another day of demonstrations on Tuesday despite government measures to address some of their concerns.

The protests, which at their peak brought more than 250,000 people to the streets across France and sometimes turned violent, eased off slightly on Friday with fewer high school closings — about 140, or 4% of the country’s total, down from 157 on Thursday, according to Agence-France Presse, citing the education ministry.

In a late evening TV interview on Thursday, Education Minister Edouard Geffray unveiled an “emergency plan” to address one of the student’s grievances. The government pledged to dispatch 3,000 additional teachers to understaffed schools throughout the country starting Friday.

At the Lycée Condorcet, near the Saint-Lazare train station in downtown Paris, the government’s measures were viewed with skepticism. On Friday morning, the high school — one of those that remains closed — was blocked by dozens of students standing on bins and asking passing cars and buses to honk. Parents at the scene said students were well organized and were coordinating efforts via chat groups. One parent said the plan to add 3,000 teachers looked like a patch, wondering where they would come from.

The protests, which began about three weeks ago with calls for smaller class sizes, building renovations and a reform of the system that allocates university slots, couldn’t have come at a worse time for the government of Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu, who is struggling to push a cost-cutting budget for 2027 through parliament to cap France’s deficit. French budget worries have sparked a sharp selloff in its bonds, raising the country’s borrowing costs.

The student unrest has added to concerns in financial markets about political instability in France. Opposition groups have toppled prime ministers twice in just the last two years over budget plans amid reluctance to compromise ahead of the country’s presidential elections in April and May.

In a speech this week, Lecornu said his full policy response to the students’ concerns would come at the end of October, taking into account their requests via an online tool.

The protests thinned on Thursday, with the interior ministry counting just over 71,500 demonstrators nationwide, less than a third of those on Tuesday . The protests have been marred by violent clashes with the police, with more than 6,500 people arrested since it began. After a student lost a hand during the protests, fueling complaints about police violence, the government suspended the use of some weapons.