France school protests leave 30,000 students without in-person classes

More than 30,000 students in France will be unable to attend in-person classes for weeks after schools sustained extensive damage amid mass student protests that began on Sept. 17.

Operative Information Center-OMM reports that French Education Minister Edouard Geffray told the National Assembly’s Committee on Cultural Affairs that 24 high schools were burned or seriously damaged during the protests.

The minister said it would take weeks to restore the schools’ operations and that preliminary estimates put the damage at tens of millions of euros.

The protests, which began with demands to improve educational conditions, quickly spread to cities across the country and escalated into riots.

According to official figures, law enforcement authorities have detained more than 6,500 people since the protests began. More than 1,000 people, including students, teachers and police officers, have been injured in clashes.