Hundreds of schools to close on Monday as education protests rock France

Up to 500 schools across France will be totally or partly closed on Monday because of a wave of pupil protests that has shaken the country, the education minister said.

Lessons will be “totally or partly suspended” in some “400-500” high schools as the security conditions “have not been fulfilled”, said Education Minister Edouard Geffray on Sunday, adding that 24 schools had been “burned or ransacked” since the start of the movement.

He described the closures as chiefly a security precaution ahead of large-scale protests that the leaders of the movement have called for Tuesday.

The teenagers at French secondary schools, known as lycées, say their studies are being ruined by high teacher absence rates, overlong school days and dilapidated facilities, as well as other grievances.