Clashes
took place between high school students and the police on Monday, September 28,
2026 in the late morning in front of the Paul-Éluard high school, in
Saint-Denis (Seine-Saint-Denis), where a blockade had been in place since the
early hours of the day. Mortars were fired at the police, who responded with
tear gas grenades. At least one arrest was made on the spot.
This
blockade is part of a high school movement launched the previous week and
clearly amplified on Monday, less than a month after the start of the school
year. Students are blockading their schools in Île-de-France, especially in
Seine-Saint-Denis and Val-de-Marne, in Stains, Saint-Ouen, Aubervilliers,
Épinay-sur-Seine, Sevran or Rosny-sous-Bois. They denounce the lack of
resources, the dilapidation of the premises, the overcrowding of classes and
the absences of teachers who have not been replaced. The Créteil education
authority notes an intensifying mobilization, considers the demands to vary
greatly from one high school to the other and believes that social networks act
as an amplifier. With nearly 2,000 students, Paul-Éluard is the largest high
school in the municipality, whose staff have been denouncing degraded reception
conditions since the beginning of the school year.
In front
of the gates, the students described an unsanitary establishment, without
heating in winter or ventilation in summer, with out-of-order sanitary
facilities, repeated damage and the presence of rodents. They also pointed to
the lack of supervisory staff and the concern related to the baccalaureate
exams. "We are just asking to redo the high school," summarized one
of them, several students saying they wanted above all to be heard.
The mayor
of Saint-Denis, Bally Bagayoko (La France Insoumise), came to support the high
school students in the early morning, who sang the Marseillaise, and was still
present at 12:30 p.m. The situation became tense shortly before midday with
mortars fired at the police, followed by the throwing of tear gas grenades and
crowd movements. After an arrest, a group of high school students went to a
police station in the city and threw projectiles at the building. According to
initial indications, incendiary devices were also used against the police and a
student was injured while handling one of them.
Similar
incidents were reported on Monday in Rosny-sous-Bois, Nanterre, Val-d'Oise,
Essonne and Seine-et-Marne, as well as in Marseille, Grenoble and in the Lyon
and Lille regions, where the Aimé-Césaire high school in Lille was set on fire.
Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez and National Education Minister Édouard Geffray
sent a telegram stating that while the expression of high school students must
be respected, violent actions cannot be tolerated, and that security forces
will endeavour to arrest perpetrators with a proportionate use of force.
Prime
Minister Sébastien Lecornu considered that nothing justified endangering
students, staff or police officers, and denounced an irresponsible
one-upmanship by elected officials of La France Insoumise. Jean-Luc Mélenchon
accused the government of having ordered the repression of a movement that he
considered harmless, calling on elected officials and activists to intervene.
The president of the Union syndicale lycéenne, Ryad Rani, described the
ministerial telegram as an unspeakable scandal and called for the blockade of
all high schools in France on Tuesday, September 29, the day of a strike in the
public service, betting on a convergence of struggles.
The
blockade of the Paul-Éluard high school in Saint-Denis illustrates the extent
of the September 2026 high school mobilization in Seine-Saint-Denis, between
demands on study conditions and interventions by the police. Tuesday, marked by
the call for the blockade of high schools and by the strike of the civil
service, will be the next deadline for the movement.
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