The facts
Education Minister Edouard Geffray told television viewers on Thursday evening that the ministry will deploy 3,000 extra supply teachers in the coming days. The promise follows a day when about 71,000 high‑school students marched across France, including 24,000 at the Bastille in Paris. Since the protests began, authorities say 6,877 people have been arrested, 86 % of them under 18. Demonstrations have sometimes turned violent: police used tear‑gas, protesters threw paving stones and homemade fireworks, a lycée in Bordeaux was ransacked and a deputy‑head was assaulted in Marseille. The minister said new ministry software will direct the teachers to roughly 500 lycées identified as most in need, many in high‑immigration suburbs, and that extra funding will be made available for teachers willing to work overtime. Student union representatives responded cautiously, saying they will watch how the promise is implemented and urging concrete financial support.
Our take
So the French state, after watching 71,000 teenagers swarm the streets and seeing police drenched in tear‑gas, decides the cure is a fresh batch of temp teachers. Brilliant, right? Geffray’s shiny new software will act like an Uber for substitute teachers, shuttling 3,000 strangers into 500 schools that have been described as the hottest spots for stone‑throwing. It’s the kind of solution that makes you wonder if the ministry’s IT department has been binge‑watching dystopian sitcoms. The students aren’t buying it. One union leader said they’ll wait to see the teachers actually show up, while another, linked to the radical‑left France Insoumise, demanded a ten‑billion‑euro budget instead of a few hundred extra contracts. The government, jittery about France’s debt and the looming 2027 education budget, is trying to appear firm without looking like it’s buying peace with cash. That’s a tightrope walk over a canyon of anger, and the only safety net is a spreadsheet. Meanwhile, schools are still being ransacked, deputy‑heads are getting roughed up, and the police are forced to fire tear‑gas at kids who are basically shouting for better resources. Deploying temps is like trying to douse a forest fire with a garden hose – you’ll get a few wet spots, but the blaze keeps roaring. The real joke here is that the state’s grand plan is a bureaucratic Band‑Aid while the kids are demanding a whole new medical system. If the ministry’s algorithm can’t sort out who needs a teacher, maybe it should start sorting out why the whole system feels like it’s on fire. Fucking absurd, but at least it gives us something to laugh about while the protests keep rolling.
