By Francesca Davis
High school students in France, angry about large class sizes, badly maintained buildings, too few teachers and shortages of resources, have taken to the streets in their hundreds of thousands.
Student strikes began in Nimes, in the south, in early October and rapidly spread nationally. Half a million students participated in a national day of action on October 16.
Marches of 20,000 demonstrators took place in the large cities of Paris, Bordeaux, Toulouse, Lyon and Paris, and of 10,000 in the smaller regional cities of Avignon, Marseille, Rouen, Brest, Nantes, Lille and many more.
On October 20, 250,000 mobilised nationally.
As Delphine, a student from Lycee Saint Sernin in Toulouse, told the Paris daily Le Monde on October 20 that her school has "only nine computers in a small room, which don't always work, for 2800 students".
Another student from a Paris high school added, "There are 42 students in my Spanish class". Another student, from Bordeaux, told the newspaper, "We have classes out on the lawn because there are not enough classrooms and there are only two staff to supervise 190 students".
Caroline, a final year student from Lycee Saint Sernin in Paris, told Le Monde: "They are conditioning us little by little to personally compensate for the real decline of the national education system".
The main secondary teacher union, the SNES, and its parent organisation, the FSU, agree that conditions in schools are bad.
The unions' figures show the average class size for year 11 is 34 in Paris and up to 39 in the provinces. At least 5000 jobs would have to be created to lower the number of students per teacher to less than 35; eliminating poorly paid compulsory overtime would create 40,000 jobs.
The SNES says 6000 teachers' jobs have been lost over the past two years. The government intends to cut 3300 student supervisors' positions in the 1999 budget.
The education minister in the Socialist Party government, Claude Allegre, has been promising a fundamental reform of the education system since last year, when he sent out a circular to 2.3 million high school students asking for comments on his planned reforms. He received 2 million replies.
Allegre's proposals centred on restructuring the curriculum in order reduce the number of subjects and the ground covered within subjects.
Most students felt the real issue was lack of education funding. Students did not want the curriculum "lightened"; rather they want more subject options and more teachers.
Students were infuriated when Allegre announced in September that the reforms would not be in place until the end of next year. This prompted the recent protests.
Students throughout France have presented Cahiers de doleances (complaint books) to school administrations and, in some cases, won concessions at a local level. The movement has united students from both technical and academic lycees (senior high schools) as well as from colleges (years 7-10).
General assemblies have been set up to plan actions and elect delegates to represent schools at regional and national meetings. Some schools have set up their own movement offices with telephones and computers.
Actions have been well-organised, students acting as marshals following outbreaks of looting and burning of cars during earlier demonstrations in Paris.
According to a survey published in Le Journal on October 18, 88% of the population believe the high school demonstrations are justified.
Two national coordinating meetings were held in Paris on October 17. The first, attended by 150-200 delegates, was initiated by FIDL and UNL, the two high school unions associated with the Socialist Party. FIDL/UNL voted for a platform that included more teachers, smaller classes and a study week of 35 hours.
Allegre has been negotiating with delegations from this group — much to the outrage of students from Auxerre, Lyon and Bordeaux, who want representatives elected from the movement's general assemblies, not student unions.
Provincial delegates from Bordeaux and Grenoble walked out and set up their own network. A delegate from Bordeaux told L'Humanite on October 20 that the provincial delegates left because they did not want the movement controlled by the FIDL because it was too close to the Socialist Party and Allegre.
According to Le Monde, the Bordeaux delegates want a provincial movement that rejects any control by student unions or political parties.
A second more radical gathering attracted 250 delegates from Paris and suburbs. Linked to the Young Revolutionary Communists (JCR) and the Young Communists (JC), its demands included the creation of 100,000 new education jobs, serious increases in the education budget, rejection of Allegre's plan and negotiations to be led by a single leadership elected by high school students.
Despite differences, all groups agreed to march together on October 20. On the back of almost daily street demonstrations, overwhelming popular support as well as support from teachers' unions and the main national parent organisation, high school students have forced Allegre to offer concessions.
On October 21, after meeting with students' representatives, Allegre unveiled his plan in the National Assembly. The government will create 28,000 more jobs in schools, Paris will loan regional governments $730 million to help improve schools, and a "students' charter" will establish minimum conditions that all schools must to conform to within two months. The charter includes a maximum class size of 35 students.
According to an Associated Press report on October 21, a national spokesperson for the FIDL grouping, Loubna Meliane, said that the coming holidays will give students time to consider the measures.
The French establishment media have been quick to define the high school movement as different from the student-led movement of 1968 because its demands centre on "succeeding in the system", not changing it.
However, slogans and banners on demonstrations suggest students feel see a link: "May-June 1968, October 1998: The struggle continues!" and "You rolled us in '68, we won't let you get us in '98".
Student discussions are ranging beyond immediate demands to address the need for critical education and student rights.
Laetitia, a Paris year 11 student, told the October 21 Le Monde she wants civic education included in the movement's demands so that "we can know what our rights are, what our role as a citizen is".
"They think we're like sheep but we're just conditioned to be like that. Things that help us develop a critical thinking should be prioritised; that would make us more free", she said.
Another feature of the actions is that they have been initiated and led largely by young women. The heads of the FIDL and UNL are women, as is its national spokesperson. Women dominate the speakers' platforms, and the French media noted early on that the demonstrations were composed mainly of young women.
Chantal, 17, from Vernon, was quoted in the London Independent on October 16 as saying: "The girls did all the talking and made the decisions. Now the boys are coming along but they were slower to get involved."
Sociologist Robert Ballion, who specialises in studying student activity in lycees, says that young women have been central to political activity there for some time.
The massive student strikes follow a series of strong but isolated high school student actions in the 1990s.
In 1990, student actions won an increase in the education budget as well as the right to form groups, paste up and hold meetings in schools. Around 250,000 in Paris and 200,000 in the provinces were involved in that struggle.
In 1995, high school students joined teachers and tertiary students on the streets around education issues.
Students from all the groups say that they will continue their protest after the holidays if they are not satisfied with Allegre's plan. Magalie, a delegate from Toulouse, pointed out, "Our success so far shows that if we act, we win. So dropping the campaign is not even a question".