By Gabriel Stargardter and Leigh Thomas
PARIS, Oct 9 (Reuters) - Clemence Remy moved to the French city of Nantes in 2020 and enrolled her two girls in the local state school. The teachers were good, but she grew so exasperated by rolling staff strikes that she eventually put them in a private school.
Those concerns about state schools have helped fuel some of France's most violent protests in decades. They began last month at high schools in Paris' poor northern suburbs, where anger over teacher absences
and shabby facilities quickly morphed into a nationwide movement against inequality, weak public spending and falling standards.
France's public schools have long been held up as a crucible of the republican ideal, a place where children from rich and poor families alike can receive a top-notch education imbued with the values of "liberty, equality and fraternity".
But performance has been slipping for years, and the government is struggling to arrest the slide as gigantic pension outlays and a need to rein in public finances leave little room for manoeuvre.
Those issues have prompted a growing number of wealthier parents to abandon the public sector in favour of private schooling. Remy said the strikes at her daughters' school in Nantes, a left-leaning city in western France, were often last-minute, requiring repeated time off work with little notice.
"School is an institution we should be able to rely on," she said. "In the end, you realise you can't rely on the system."
STANDARDS FALL AS PENSIONS GOBBLE UP SHRINKING FUNDS
The maths and reading levels of French 15-year-olds have fallen drastically since 2003, reaching a record low well below the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development average, according to the body's 2025 "PISA" results.
French state secondary schools were unable to staff nearly 10% of teaching hours - or almost half a day of teaching per week - in the 2024/25 school year, of which three-quarters is due to the non-replacement of absent teachers.
Between 10% and 20% of French school buildings are "in a significantly deteriorated condition", according to a 2025 report by Banque des Territoires, the investment arm of state-owned lender Caisse des Dépôts.
The government's inability to turn the tide on education is partly explained by a growing pensions bill that sucks resources away from other priorities, experts say.
France's 2027 education budget is €64 billion ($72 billion). Teachers' pensions add another 28% to the cost.
Total government spending on pensions, which is due to reach 436 billion euros or 14% of economic output next year, has grown faster than all other categories of public expenditure over the last two decades, while spending has slipped for education, according to Reuters calculations based on Eurostat data.
The steady growth in pension spending is due not only to an ageing population, but also to voters' resistance to increasing the retirement age or reducing what retirees get.
Economist Erwann Tison of the think tank Institut de l’Entreprise said pension spending "cannibalises" the education budget. That means France can only pay early-career teachers below-OECD-average salaries that contribute to frustration and strike action.
"France is effectively handing over large subsidies to older French at the expense of everyone else," Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman wrote on his Substack on Thursday. "Mass national student demonstrations should come as no surprise."
WEALTHIER FAMILIES MIGRATE TO PRIVATE SCHOOLS
The vast majority of French private schools operate according to the "under-contract" model.
Almost entirely Catholic-run, such schools have greater control over staffing and admissions. Their teachers are paid by the state, with fees covering non-teaching costs. A larger pool of substitute teachers means they are less affected by strikes or absences.
Over 2 million children, or 17.6% of all pupils, attend one of France's more than 7,500 under-contract schools, according to a 2023 national audit office report.
Although this proportion rose modestly between 2011 and 2021, the percentage of children from wealthier families has grown at the expense of poorer children, the report found. It said some families had moved over to avoid local state schools, or had concerns about safety and teacher absences.
Pupils from "very advantaged" families accounted for 40.2% of the total in 2021 compared to just 26.4% in 2000, while over half of pupils at under-contract schools now come from "advantaged or very advantaged" backgrounds, compared with less than a third in state schools.
"Fifty years ago, ambitious families aimed for the public sector," said Louis Chauvel, a sociologist at the University of Luxembourg. "Today, private institutions are often seen as the better route if you want to maximise your kids' chances."
Virginie Durin, the president of Apel, France's main association representing parents of pupils in Catholic private schools, said not all were wealthy, and that many parents made great sacrifices to afford them.
But she acknowledged a growing concentration of wealthier students in certain neighbourhoods.
Nantes, where Remy lives, is a stronghold of under-contract schools in France, with 38% of pupils privately educated.
Remy, who pays €191 ($214) a month per child, recognised that private schools were not affordable for everyone, and were at risk of being colonised by the wealthy. But she had no regrets.
"I think it provides an environment where at least the children are encouraged to strive and do better."
($1 = 0.8920 euros)
(Reporting by Gabriel Stargardter and Leigh Thomas; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
