A 15-year-old lost a hand on Monday (October 5, 2026) in the latest round of French high school protests that have erupted into clashes with police, with more than 200 students injured in the violence.
France has been shaken by a wave of demonstrations by teenage students at high schools, or lycees, since late September demanding better classroom conditions. In central Paris, dozens of teenage students demonstrated outside a school while passing cars honked their horns. Some classmates made their way inside to attend lessons.
“They think that just because they’re letting us express ourselves on a platform, on the internet, we’ll stop blocking access and being angry, but this anger has been here for years,” said Simon, a pupil also at the Lycee Charlemagne.
The movement started on September 17 at a high school in the Paris suburb of Creteil, in support of teachers striking over a lack of staff and resources.
Some protesters outside the Gustave Eiffel high school set off fireworks in the direction of police, who responded with tear gas, but overall the situation remained calm, AFP reporters said.
More than 500 of France’s 3,700 lycees were fully or partially closed on Monday (October 5, 2026), and bigger demonstrations dubbed “Act III” by a secondary school students’ union are expected on Tuesday as social media calls mount for a “black week” of protests. “It’s clear the education system isn’t working,” Alma, a pupil at the Lycee Charlemagne in central Paris, told AFP .
