Student protests in France: five-point plan, but no liberation yet

Student protests in France Five-point plan, but no liberation yet As of: October 27, 2026 • 3:22 a.m

In France, the government is approaching the protesting students with a catalog of measures. They welcome the education minister's five-point plan, but want to demonstrate again next Saturday.

It's not a liberation yet, but it's a first step. When the representatives of the student body left the Prime Minister's official residence in the afternoon, they seemed proud of having achieved something. “We can congratulate ourselves on some of our first victories,” said Marius Mesnil from the largest student union, Union syndicale lycéenne. “We have achieved a lot when it comes to the shortage of teachers, the number of students per class and the renovation of the building.” This shows that the mobilization worked.

France's government is making its first concessions - but the students want more Claudia Kornmeier, ARD Paris, tagesschau, Das Erste, October 27, 2026 • 5:00 p.m. The government has actually given in on some points. At his press conference in the evening, Minister Édouard Geffray initially admitted that the students were under enormous pressure. This was shown by the evaluation of the more than 100,000 entries on the specially created digital complaint platform.

According to the government, there were attacks on law enforcement officers, teachers and passers-by. more

The pressure arises from the uncertainty when allocating study places, from the early determination of majors and from the full classes.

The minister announced that the class size in level 10 would be gradually reduced to 28 students. He wants to start with the less well-off half of all lycées. And Geffray promised to hire new teachers: "We are leaving the 836 planned job cuts in place. Instead, we are creating 500 new teaching positions for the upper grades."

The government's announcement that it would make concessional loans worth four billion euros available for the renovation of school buildings met with a mixed response.

Kamel Chibli, vice president of the Occitania region, criticized the measure as ignoring the real problem. He said on France Info: "They're making fun of us. We don't need the government to take out loans." What is needed is a “green fund that is specifically set up for the energy-efficient renovation of buildings”. This has been demanded for months. “We need this fund to finally be able to renovate in a way that is tailored to the region.”

France wants to organize substitute teachers at short notice. It is unclear whether this will curb student protests. more

It was eagerly awaited how the government would respond to the demand to abolish the controversial study place allocation platform Parcoursup. Education Minister Geffray has now announced that he wants to make it more transparent as a first step in order to then replace it with a new system in 2028. Student representative Marius Mesnil is not yet satisfied with this: "Replacing Parcoursup is good, but at the same time they only offer us 15,000 new study places." That's too little, then it remains a matter of selection. "We are calling for 250,000 new study places so that no more students are sorted out."

Together with the student representatives, the student unions have announced that they will demonstrate again next Saturday. There is no relief for the government for the time being.

This topic in the program: tagesschau.de | Student protests - government reacts: first step, but no liberation | Oct 26, 2026 | 9:57 p.m