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Photograph: Nacho Doce/Reuters     (schools-france-closed-protests-planned.html#img-1)   View image in fullscreen       High-school students protesting in France. Photograph: Nacho Doce/Reuters       (https://www.theguardian.com/world/france) France     More than 400 schools in France to be closed on Monday as more protests planned   Education minister says 24 schools have been burnt or ransacked and 78 staff members injured since student unrest began last month (https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2026/oct/04/friedrich-merz-german-chancellor-ukraine-kyiv-russia-strikes-war-zelenskyy-putin-europe-latest-news-updates) Europe live – latest updates            (https://www.theguardian.com/profile/rorycarroll) Rory Carroll   Sun 4 Oct 2026 11.08 EDT  Last modified on Sun 4 Oct 2026 15.31 EDT   (mailto:?subject=More than 400 schools in France to be closed on Monday as more protests planned&body=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/oct/04/schools-france-closed-protests-planned?CMP=share_btn_url) Share          (https://www.google.com/preferences/source?q=theguardian.com) Prefer the Guardian on Google          More than 400 schools in (https://www.theguardian.com/world/france) France will be closed or partly closed on Monday as authorities brace for another week of student protests. Lessons will be totally or partly suspended in 400 to 500 schools because security conditions “have not been fulfilled”, the education minister, Édouard Geffray, said on Sunday.  The minister said 24 schools had been burnt or ransacked and 78 education staff members injured. The number of school closures on Monday would be comparable to Friday’s but the government envisaged a “partial, progressive return to lessons”, said Geffray. Thousands of teenagers staged widespread demonstrations and (http://theguardian.com/world/2026/oct/02/student-protests-shut-schools-across-france) erected barricades last week to protest against what they said was underfunding and neglect of the education system.       (Students block the entrance to Ampere high school in Lyon.)   (schools-france-closed-protests-planned.html#img-2)   View image in fullscreen       Students block the entrance to Ampere high school in Lyon.  Photograph: Konrad K/Sipa/Shutterstock  Clashes with riot police left hundreds of people injured, led to more than 5,000 arrests, mostly of minors, and jolted President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist administration. There was a lull at the weekend, but protest organisers called for renewed demonstrations on Tuesday because the government had failed to produce “concrete measures”. Authorities say political agitators have infiltrated the protest, which started at a Paris school on 17 September and spread across the capital and the rest of France. “There are activists – particularly from the far left – who have infiltrated the high school student movement, hijacked it from the students themselves, and engaged in extreme violence,” said Geffray. “Clearly, this poses a risk to both our staff and our students.” The injured education staff members were deliberately targeted, “something we have never seen before”, said Geffray. The protests (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/oct/01/france-school-protests-escalate-pm-crisis-cabinet-meeting) caught the government by surprise and confronted Macron with his worst crisis in months. Images of burning barricades and police using teargas, batons and other methods to disperse protests have dominated TV news. (schools-france-closed-protests-planned.html#EmailSignup-skip-link-11) skip past newsletter promotion     Free newsletter | Every day    Sign up to Headlines Europe  A digest of the morning's main headlines from the Europe edition emailed direct to you every week day  ()   Enter your email  ()   Sign up      after newsletter promotion         (A line of riot police stand in a street behind overturned green wheelie bins and flames. Smoke is rising from the fire.)   (schools-france-closed-protests-planned.html#img-3)   View image in fullscreen       Security forces are stationed at Place de la Nation in Paris on Friday during the student protests.  Photograph: Giulia Morici/NurPhoto/Shutterstock  Student grievances include overcrowded classes of up to 40 children in crumbling buildings, poor teacher pay, staff absences and an unequal system in which social background determined success. Other factors are an opaque and difficult online system for university applications as well as the sweltering temperatures in classrooms during (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jun/25/french-heat-trap-homes-climate-inequality-grows) heatwaves . Protesters have accused the state of disengaging from secondary education and cited difficult conditions such as leaks, cockroaches, collapsed ceilings and decayed buildings. Others have complained about excessively long school days and a lack of teaching staff. The government said the grievances were legitimate but condemned what it called “urban violence”. On Sunday, police detained a 16-year-old in relation to an assault of a teacher in La Ciotat, a town on the southern coast between Marseille and Toulon. The teacher, 59, was doused with gasoline and struck during a protest on Friday. The government is also under pressure from trade unions that called a day of (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/02/france-strikes-unions-new-pm) strikes last week to compel the new prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, to rethink budget cuts and consider a form of wealth tax on the super-rich. The CGT trade union exhorted workers to sustain the pressure with demonstrations this week.         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