法国高中生因缺老师罢课抗议：二十五万人上街，五百多所学校停课

Three weeks ago, students at a high school next to Paris walked out of their classrooms.

Today, hundreds of high schools in France can't hold classes.

How did this start?

In late September, in a place next to Paris called Créteil, students at one high school began to protest.

To protest means many people stand up and say loudly: this is wrong, we want change.

High school is the school that students aged fifteen to eighteen attend.

What are these high-schoolers protesting about?

First, there aren't enough teachers.

Students say that many times, when it's time for class, the teacher doesn't come.

In France's public secondary schools, in nearly every ten lessons, one has no teacher.

Second, there are too many people in a class.

One student said: our class has thirty-five people, and there aren't even enough chairs in the classroom.

Third, the schools are too old.

Students said: the building is falling apart, the place we eat is too small, and the school has no money at all.

In summer, classrooms can get as hot as thirty-five degrees.

After students at one school protested, students at other schools came out too.

On September 30th, more than 250,000 people across France took to the streets, with 56,000 in Paris alone.

But the protests soon stopped being peaceful.

Some people set fires in schools, some hit teachers, and some fought with police.

Police took many people away; on one day, they took away nearly two thousand.

Most of those taken were minors.

Minors are people who aren't yet eighteen.

In northern France, a fifteen-year-old student lost a hand in an explosion during a clash with police.

Many people were very upset to hear this news.

By October 5th, more than five hundred schools in France were fully or partly closed.

France has 3,700 high schools in total.

France's education minister said schools will slowly, bit by bit, start classes again.

The government also said it will give schools more money, so every class has a teacher.

But there's a big problem behind all this: France is short of money, and the government keeps trying to spend less.

The students say: the money you save can't be taken from our classrooms.

Think about it: if your teacher often didn't come to class, what would you do?