Police deployed tear gas against crowds assembling across Paris and elsewhere in the country, with official tallies placing attendance at over 250,000 people — a figure that included large numbers of secondary school students calling for more funding to be directed at education. Demonstrations added to the strain already bearing on the administration of Emmanuel Macron, who is set to leave office.
Demonstrators carrying flags and placards filled the streets of Marseille, Strasbourg, and other towns, while students once more set up blockades outside secondary schools. Walkouts at a secondary school in the Paris region around mid-September grew into a nationally coordinated wave of student action by the time those gatherings were held — part of a pattern of public mobilisations that have recurred since the current administration came to power. In Lille, Léa Monimart, one of the participants, argued that 17-year-olds deserve to be taken seriously, pointing to their awareness of the issues and their capacity to engage with them.
The Interior Ministry put nationwide attendance on Tuesday at 256,000, with 56,000 of those gathered in Paris, where the day's events unfolded largely without incident — though isolated confrontations between protesters and police in riot gear did break out at one city square along the route.
The use of tear gas, crowd-control munitions, and mass detention against young protesters has prompted objections from some parents and educators, while those affected have shown little inclination to stand down. Nuñez, in his capacity as Interior Minister, told reporters that law enforcement's conduct had been measured and appropriate across nearly all of the incidents reviewed, and that the demonstrations had at points escalated into circumstances warranting a police presence.
Lecornu called on both the government and school administrators to take student concerns seriously and work toward practical responses. During a parliamentary session on Tuesday, Lecornu told lawmakers that acts of violence tied to the protest movement were putting schools at risk. Facing questions about policing methods, he gave a commitment that any incidents described as "accidents" would be subject to review, while flatly rejecting claims of racism within the force as untrue.
Over a span exceeding two weeks, student-led classroom walkouts and school blockades — alongside law enforcement actions resulting in upwards of 6,100 detentions, the majority involving minors — have drawn the unfolding presidential race into the dispute. Felix Barney, a university student, characterised the police response as out of proportion, questioning why batons, rubber bullets, and tear gas would be deployed against minors, a view echoed by France Unbowed lawmaker Aurélien Le Coq, whose party's presidential candidate has voiced support for the protests. Le Coq characterised the violence as having reached a level that no person could reasonably be expected to withstand.
Nuñez stood by the methods used by officers in crowd-control situations, even as reports of people sustaining injuries from police equipment continued to mount. On Monday, a teenage boy aged 15 had his hand severed in an episode involving a police stun grenade. According to the account provided by Nuñez, a total of 715 officers sustained injuries.
Discontent that had been gathering momentum across France found an outlet in the actions of younger protesters. Those anxieties extend well beyond the near-term strain of fuel prices pushed higher by the conflict involving Iran, reaching into longer-running disputes over public spending ceilings, data pointing to an expansion of poverty, and a documented widening of the gap between the wealthiest and lowest-income households across the years Macron held office — a presidency that has now run its constitutional course, with no provision allowing him to stand for a further consecutive term.
Pupils contending that gaps in school funding are undermining their futures have found an audience for that concern, with a handwritten placard attached to a metal railing outside a Paris school reading: "You say 'young people are the future', so listen to them." Outside the Hélène Boucher lycée in Paris's 20th arrondissement, a group of demonstrators knocked over bins and bicycles, arranging them across the entrance to form an improvised barrier. The institution joined hundreds of others across the country in closing its doors.
School closures were put in place the week prior as a response to property damage at educational facilities and a growing count of injuries reported among students, teachers, and law enforcement personnel. Instruction from the Education Ministry indicated that 891 schools had their lessons halted or cut short on Tuesday, either fully or in part.
The ministry set up an anonymised online platform through which secondary school pupils could submit accounts of their day-to-day experiences and outline the reforms they wished to see — a move that came after it had been under pressure to engage with protesters. At Hélène Boucher on Tuesday, adults — parents among them — took up positions between the two groups, keeping a watchful eye on the younger students. Emilia Sichili Suriam, a member of a parents' association, put forward the view that teachers, parents, and federations are united around a common aim — upholding children's rights — and that taking to the streets to voice demands on that basis falls within accepted civic practice.
Those taking part in the demonstrations have outlined a set of grievances tied to how resources and opportunities are distributed across the school system — among them, ageing buildings where students lack basic furniture, classrooms that become stifling during warmer months without any ventilation or cooling equipment, and some sites where pest activity has been documented. Among the grievances raised most frequently, understaffing and punishing workloads feature prominently. Required contact hours push lycée students in France toward the upper end of attendance figures recorded across Europe.
Suzanne Nijdam, who leads the federation of student associations, told reporters that protests would persist until authorities respond to the grievances raised, adding that the matter rested with the government to follow through on those demands and that doing so amounted to a question of where political priorities lay — specifically, whether young people and the country's future would be placed at the forefront.
