Education

Faculty vote will continue until next Friday and could send message that school’s president has lost their confidence.

Cornell University has begun a no-confidence vote for the school’s leadership after an alleged gang rape prompted public outcry over sexual assault on college campuses and scrutiny over the university’s handling of the case.

Faculty members started the no-confidence vote on Thursday that is expected to continue until November 6. The initiative is non-binding, but could send a message that president Michael Kotlikoff has lost the confidence of the school’s faculty.

“Hundreds of students, staff, faculty and alumni approached the sponsors of this resolution to emphasize to us that the Jane Doe case is but a tip of the iceberg,” said Paul Ortiz, the lead faculty sponsor of the resolution.

A lawsuit filed last month alleges that a female student, identified as Jane Doe, was drugged and gang raped by seven male students at a fraternity house in 2024.

The case has raised questions about whether the university acted with sufficient urgency or downplayed the alleged abuse in order to protect its reputation. The university initially shut down the fraternity and suspended the male students, two of whom were later expelled.

Faculty considered on Wednesday whether to postpone a vote of no confidence, with some urging patience and others arguing that the vote was a necessary response to institutional reluctance to take the issue seriously.

The Associated Press news agency reported that the debate took place after a group of 20 female science and engineering faculty members called on Kotlikoff to resign in a letter to trustees.

“What our community needed was clear leadership; instead, it faced a leadership vacuum,” the letter stated.

Kotlikoff sought to address the fallout in a statement earlier this month in which he listed a number of preliminary responses.

“I am deeply sorry for the harm Jane Doe suffered in 2024, and appalled that this act of sexual violence occurred within our Cornell community,” he said.

Two of the men accused of taking part in the alleged rape of Jane Doe have asked for New York Attorney General Letitia James to be removed from her role overseeing the renewed criminal probe into the case over social media posts from the attorney general expressing support for the accuser prior to her appointment.

A judge on Thursday appeared sceptical of one of the challenges, which James’ office has said are “without merit”.

Faraba Banta, The Gambia – For Muhammed Lamin Jallow, a student at the University of The Gambia’s School of Arts and Sciences, getting to class has become a daily struggle.

He travels about 40 km (25 miles) from home to the Faraba Banta campus, depending on university buses, to attend lectures.

But securing a seat on the bus can be challenging.

“Sometimes, it feels like survival of the fittest,” he told Al Jazeera. “We compete as to who gets in first, who gets to sit, who gets to stand and who goes to school and who does not.”

Jallow was among hundreds of students who protested at the University of The Gambia (UTG) on Monday, taking their grievances over transportation, campus facilities and student welfare to the vice chancellor’s office.

Lectures have since resumed after the government promised improvements to campus services.

But the students have more demands. They want Vice Chancellor Herbert Robinson and the director of student affairs to resign, accusing both officials of failing to perform their duties.

While the government has announced measures to address some of the concerns, the leadership dispute remains unresolved.

Transport and basic services remain concerns

The Students’ Union says its concerns affect more than 12,000 students, many of whom depend on university buses to reach campus.

Following the protest, Higher Education Minister Professor Pierre Gomez visited the campus with university representatives and officials from the Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy.

In a statement, the Ministry of Higher Education, Research, Science and Technology said the Gambia Transport Service Company had deployed 20 buses to support student transportation.

Students have also complained of limited access to safe drinking water and affordable food, as well as unreliable internet connectivity.

In response, the ministry promised that cafeterias across the university were ready to serve students and staff, but acknowledged that additional filtration was needed to make campus water safe for drinking. Water jars and dispensers have been installed at designated points, and the National Water and Electricity Company (NAWEC) had been consulted, it said.

On internet access, the ministry said work was under way to extend connectivity to the newly constructed Schools of Agriculture and Law, with completion expected within a week.

The proposals are intended to support student access to research materials and other educational resources. However, the statement did not confirm whether the work had been completed.

The ministry said it would continue working with the university, the students’ union and other relevant stakeholders to monitor implementation.

Cafeterias and practical training facilities

The reopening of cafeterias was another demand raised by students, who had complained that their closure made it difficult to find affordable meals on campus.

Ismaila Fadera, the students’ union president, said he raised the issue with Robinson on October 20 .

Fadera quoted the vice chancellor as saying: “Mister president, I have the student interest at heart, but we must balance this against administrative processes and compliance. You know I was a student too and many of us went through that. I used to carry my own water and food in my bag to university. The students should be told the reality. Having a cafeteria is a great addition to enhance the student experience but it is not right.”

The ministry said the cafeterias were ready to serve students and staff, although it provided no details on meal prices or availability at individual facilities.

Beyond food and water, students say inadequate learning facilities are affecting their education, particularly in programmes that require practical training.

At the School of Medicine and Allied Health Sciences in Banjul, students face overcrowded classrooms, inadequate ventilation, malfunctioning electrical sockets and shortages of projectors and smartboards, according to Abubacarr Manneh, president of the University of The Gambia Medical Students Association. Manneh said medical, nursing and postgraduate nursing students share the available facilities, putting pressure on classroom space.

He also worries about shortages of practical training equipment, including a promised simulation laboratory where students could develop clinical skills.

“Practical sessions are crucial in our professional training and development for better care of our patients,” he told Al Jazeera.

The university’s journalism students have similar concerns

Sukai Fatajo, a journalism student who participated in the protest, said the school needed radio and television studios to help students develop practical skills.

“We deserve better, and our demands must be met,” she told Al Jazeera.

The students’ union has also called for functional science laboratories, improvements to facilities at the medical school and adequate staffing.

The risks of getting to class

For Kumba Leigh, a journalism student, the struggle to reach the university has also become a question of personal safety.

One morning in April, Leigh was attacked by a knife-wielding assailant in her hometown of Bakau as she walked to a bus stop. She was trying to leave home early enough to secure a seat.

The attacker threatened to kill her if she did not hand over her bag. When she resisted, he struck her on the head and shoulder, cut her bag and dislocated her right arm. A nearby shopkeeper intervened, forcing the assailant to flee.

Months later, Leigh still has pain in her arm and suffers from trauma.

“No one should have to risk their life simply to travel to school,” she told Al Jazeera, calling for stronger security and increased police patrols.

A primary school teacher revealed he even had his nipples removed and eyeballs tattooed

A primary school teacher has described the lengths he’s gone to in order to get more tattoos.

Sylvain Helaine has been working in classrooms in both the UK and his native France for nearly two decades. However, he has revealed that he began a new, unique journey in 2012, when he was 27.

Back then, he got his first tattoo. Now, aged 40, he is the most tattooed teacher. Sylvain made a special appearance on This Morning, in a tell-all chat with hosts Dermot O’Leary and Sian Welby.

The ITV presenters opened the segment by describing what comes to mind when they think of their own primary school teachers. Sylvain told them he was working in Britain when he saw someone with a full sleeve, which opened his eyes and led him to get an arm tattoo of his own.

He quickly became increasingly dedicated to getting more. Sylvain confessed that he always knew he wanted to be ‘fully covered’. Asked about how it has impacted his work, he told them: “During the first day [of school], because if I do something good, people will say, ‘Oh, obviously he’s the best, we were about to see that’. But if I do something a little bad, they will think that I’m awful because of my appearance.”

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As they asked about what kind of reactions Sylvain receives in his line of work, he revealed that he had previously said: “It always takes two minutes for children to accept me, two hours for the parents, and two days for grandparents. So it just takes a little bit of time.”

Sylvain went on to reveal that he doesn’t actually talk about his tattoos while at work. He revealed: “I don’t talk about my tattoos and my appearance at all when we are in the classroom. We just work, we take out our exercise book, write out the date, and it goes like that. I’m really serious. But if they have some questions to ask me, they can wait for the playground, for example.”

The teacher’s tattoo journey is far from over, however. He shared that he intends to go over some of his existing ink on most of his body again.

Sian pointed out that the whites of his eyes have also been completely covered with black ink. He also had his nipples and belly button removed.

His reason was to have a smoother skin surface. to make the tattooing process easier and get more. Other places he has been tattooed include his tongue, and underneath his nails on both his hands and feet.

However, when asked if he was ‘addicted’ to getting them, he shared that he actually can’t stand getting them and does not look forward to the next session. He explained: “I hate the pain. I hate getting tattooed.”

He continued: “I love evolving. I love seeing myself evolving. You suffer, and I really hate the pain and am counting the days to the next tattoo session. I’m really anxious. I don’t want to go, but at the end of the tattoo session, I’m really proud, and I feel invincible.”

This Morning continues tomorrow at 10.00am on ITV1 and ITVX.

They said they had no work-life balance

A family who moved to Britain’s most remote inhabited island, where just 50 people live, say it takes seven hours to get a takeaway curry delivered.

Katy Phenix, 33, partner Josh Moore, 35, and their kids have relocated to Fair Isle for a quieter life after quitting the rat race of working long 12-hour days. She saw an Instagram ad to live and work on the Scottish island near Sheltand and registered ”on a whim”.

They applied to move to the isle – where there are more birds than people – despite never visiting before. Numbers are strictly controlled and new residents are only allowed in when others leave.

Interview process

They had to go through a rigorous interview process with its inhabitants and the National Trust for Scotland to ensure they were a “good fit”. Four months later, Katy and Josh moved to the UK’s most geographically remote inhabited island.

They were accompanied by their children, Hetty, six, and Teddy, 11, three dogs and four cats. Despite the huge lifestyle change, they said they are now living the “absolute dream” – and all the children miss from the mainland is a trip to McDonald’s.

But they say they’ve learned to be resourceful, getting an Indian takeaway on the Island ferry, which took seven hours from Shetland to their croft, in what they describe as a “military operation”. Katy revealed they can place the order with the Indian at midday, order a taxi to pick it up and take it to the island ferry.

It is then picked up from the ferry and heated up for dinner when it arrives. Apart from missing easy access to their favourite takeaway, Katy, an early years practitioner, and Josh, an electrician, said the move has been a dream.

No work-life balance before

They had almost no work-life balance and “lived to work” when they applied from North Yorkshire in March 2026. They sold their three-bed new build home in Redcar and are now renting a five-bedroom house with 17 acres of land and five outbuildings from the National Trust.

She said: “We had a really large mortgage in England, but now pay peanuts in comparison to live in one of the most beautiful areas of the UK. It feels like we’ve won the lottery. I don’t think you could get a bigger change of lifestyle – but as a family we are all loving it.

“We were kind of like passing ships in the night before. Neither of us thought there was any chance at all we would hear back from our application, but the more we researched into it the more we were totally hooked.”

Fair Isle sits about 24 miles south of the Shetland Mainland in the North Sea. After their interview in May 2026, they received their offer to move to the island.

Massive gamble

Katy, who now works around four hours a day Monday to Friday, said: “It was a massive gamble and a long journey. It cost us £8,000 for the move in July.

“The only thing we knew is that there was a five-bedroom house, and it had 17 acres of land and five outbuildings. We saw a floor plan, but that was out of date.”

Outgoing tenants Deryk and Hollie and their four children have been a great help to Katy and Josh, passing on all of their crofting knowledge with a yearly planner and selling their sheep to help them start their own croft. There are seven children living on the island, five in school, one in nursery and an infant with two teenagers in high school on the mainland.

Hetty and Teddy were able to have calls with the school to help get them settled before the move. Luckily for them, there was a six-year-old girl and an 11-year-old boy already on the island, giving them “an immediate best friend”.

Katy said: “The little boy and Teddy are off all the time mushrooming, fishing, they’re in our outbuildings making weird contraptions out of wood. Hetty is such a little animal lover, she’s been out with the sheep and we’ve got hens she’s with all the time. We’ve not had many challenges at all.”

With no high school, teenagers go to a school on the mainland with free accommodation and frequent trips home. Every half term the Fair Isle children will go to visit to meet their future classmates and ensure a smooth transition when they begin school.

The island has a pub in their bird observatory in the summer season, shop open four days a week, a Post Office and even has Amazon Prime. There is also a nurse on the island and when any situation begins to raise concerns, it takes a helicopter 15 minutes from Shetland and patients are airlifted off the island. Josh has found a lot of work as resident handyman.

Katy said: “He’s been out today fixing someone’s washing machine. He’s re-plumbed our house, he’s done everything.”

Slower pace of life

The significantly slower pace in life and family time has been the ultimate highlight for Katy.

She said: “We’re not stressed and overworked, we’re so much more present for the children. I remember Teddy once said ‘oh mum you’re so much nicer in the school holidays’. It was a throwaway comment, he didn’t mean anything by it.

“It stuck with me. I never wanted to be that mum, but it was kind of the way life pans out and you accidentally get there.

“This has just given us that time to breathe and be as a family. We do everything together and that’s made it totally worth it.”

What would typically look like a five-minute job can take residents three weeks to do, as they need to plan ahead for deliveries. They are also bound by the weather as the small plane or ferry may not be able to get to them as planned.

Learning how to shear and herd 30 sheep and a ram has not been the easiest at times, but it’s “all hands on deck”, and the children love it. Teddy uses his shepherd’s hook and chases the sheep as the family doesn’t have a sheep dog.

Katy said: “I think the massive misconception is that it’s lonely and there’s nothing to do. That couldn’t be further from the truth.

“Our lives haven’t actually changed that much. We’ve got something on every day.

“Everybody is here to help you out. I have a really good group of mum friends here. I do pilates and yoga. This is the most social I’ve ever been and Josh is quite an introvert, so he’s really come out of his shell now.”

Full calendar

Their calendar is always full with dress-up parties or harvest festivals. Katy is even learning the tradition of Fair Isle knitting from another resident to help keep the culture alive, a craft skill welcomed by the National Trust to maintain tradition.

Crofting and fishing were the other traditional occupations, but today the island’s economy is far more diverse. There are significantly more species of bird on the island than people, with over 350 different kinds.

To move to the island you have to wait for a current family to move away. National Trust for Scotland then reviews all applications to check for appropriate skills and applicants will be shortlisted and interviewed. Other desirable skills include direct experience in crofting and land management, trade skills such as plumbing expertise, joinery, or maritime skills.

Polls show populist leader Aleksandar Vucic in a tight race against the anticorruption and anti-authoritarian movement.

Serbians are voting in parliamentary elections amid a mass student protest ⁠movement that seeks to oust longtime populist leader Aleksandar Vucic, who has held power as prime minister and then president for more than a decade.

The snap elections, called by Vucic in September, follow almost two years of student-led demonstrations against perceived corruption ⁠and creeping authoritarianism, triggered by the deaths of 16 people when a train station canopy collapsed in the city of Novi Sad in 2024.

The students have since gained widespread support.

A loss for Vucic ⁠would mark a profound political shift in the Balkan country of some 6 million people, reminiscent of the defeat of Hungary’s Viktor Orban in April.

But Vucic, who resigned as president in September to run again for prime minister, is a strong incumbent. Many voters thank him for pulling Serbia out of economic obscurity and ‌orchestrating a period of sustained modernisation.

“The Serbian election ⁠is shaping up to be a watershed moment for the country as the Student List mounts the biggest challenge against Vucic yet,” Mario Bikarski, senior Europe analyst at risk consultancy Verisk Maplecroft, told the Reuters news agency.

During the campaign, Vucic has promised higher pensions and public sector salaries, investment in state healthcare, and subsidies for young couples. He has balanced closer ties with China, a major investor, and Russia, Serbia’s traditional ally and principal supplier of natural gas, while leaving the door open to joining the European Union.

But relations with the EU have frayed under his leadership, with the bloc growing increasingly frustrated over a lack of reforms addressing the judiciary, the rule of law and corruption.

The Student List movement’s agenda focuses on rooting out corruption and improving schooling, while saying little about their international ambitions.

Their roster of 250 largely unfamiliar candidates, including university professors, actors and farmers, is led by cardiologist Ilija Srdanovic.

Opinion polls are predicting a tight race.

An Ipsos poll published on Thursday gives Vucic’s Serbian Progressive Party 47 percent ⁠of the vote to the students’ 40 percent, though other polls have put the students ahead.

Rights groups and activists say repression has worsened since the deadly train station canopy collapse, which was widely blamed on government corruption and sparked the student demonstrations.

About 150,000 supporters of the student movement rallied in central Belgrade on Thursday.

Vucic and his party have repeatedly denied accusations of repression, corruption and spying on their opponents.

The former president claims the students are funded by foreign agents in Croatia and Montenegro, a charge the students deny.

Pete Hegseth says the Pentagon dismantled 80 ‘propaganda cells’ operating under new names at 30 universities.

The United States Department of Defense has designated Confucius Institutes, Chinese-funded cultural centres on university campuses, as a threat to US national security.

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced the move on Friday in a video posted on social media, saying the Pentagon added the organisations to its list of institutions that threaten national security.

Washington has long accused the centres of serving as Chinese propaganda tools and has taken steps to crack down on them.

Hegseth said Confucius Institutes had operated in disguise after being restricted by Congress, calling them “sleeper organisations”.

“It turns out that 80 new propaganda cells across 30 universities had popped up using different names and different charters, but with the same mission: to steal intellectual property and to infiltrate the minds of American students,” he said.

In the video, Hegseth said that Chinese government-backed cultural programmes had infiltrated universities and reappeared in new guises despite congressional restrictions.

Over the past two months, the Pentagon has “systematically dismantled every single one of these organisations”, he said.

The Chinese embassy in Washington did not respond to Reuters’ request for comment.

Public sector workers and teachers joined student protesters, amid growing youth-led demonstrations across Europe.

Thousands of students and teachers ‌have rallied across cities in Greece, demanding more funding for ⁠education, including better facilities and smaller ⁠class sizes.

The demonstrations echo a wave of youth-led protests across Europe this month, including in France and Albania, where anger over rising costs and alleged corruption has led to clashes with police and major property damage.

Greek police said about 10,000 demonstrators, including school and university students, rallied peacefully in central Athens and the capital’s suburbs on Wednesday.

“From Greece to France, we want public, free education,” protesters chanted as they gathered outside Parliament, where students staged an overnight sit-in nearby before the rally.

Others joined the protests in Thessaloniki, Patras, Larissa and other cities ⁠across Greece in solidarity with growing demonstrations in France and elsewhere in Europe, where rallies demanding educational resources have morphed into angry demonstrations over soaring living costs.

Cost-of-living crisis

In Greece, the protests add pressure to ⁠Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and his centre-right government as the country prepares to hold elections in mid-2027 amid a weakening economy.

Greece struggled with a serious debt crisis from 2009 to 2018, during which the government agreed to spending cuts in exchange for three European Union and International Monetary Fund bailouts worth about 290 billion euros ($326bn).

But the measures have impacted Greek workers, who are among the poorest in Europe and struggle with stagnant wages, high rents and rising energy costs.

The average monthly salary of 1,500 euros ($1,685) sits at 2009 levels, with many young Greeks having been priced out of housing in ⁠cities by skyrocketing rents.

“Surviving here is very difficult; the ⁠rent is really high, the houses are really small. Our parents can’t make ends meet to pay for our rent, the electricity, for our life here,” university student Georgia Foukidou, 21, who joined the protest in Athens, told the Reuters news agency.

The protests on Wednesday included strikes by primary and secondary school teachers protesting low pay and staff shortages, while substitute teachers demanded permanent positions and reduced class sizes. Public sector workers and other unions also joined the demonstrations.

Education Minister Sofia Zacharaki said prior to the protests that she was listening to student demands, noting that the government was spending more than 733 million euros ($823m) on new student residences and facilities upgrades.

Mitsotakis’ government has also pledged about one billion euros ($1.12bn) in state subsidies and other benefits to offset increased energy costs for households and businesses due to the Iran war and inflation.

Paris, France – After nationwide protests turned violent, French President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday night tried to strike a balance between acknowledging the concerns of students demanding changes to the education system and criticising rioters.

“Those who have destroyed property must pay. Those who have looted must reimburse their victims. Those who sought to bring down the republic will be held accountable,” Macron said.

But the president’s speech was not what Yanis, a 20-year-old from Ivry-sur-Seine, a suburb just southeast of Paris, wanted to hear.

“He gave his usual ‘bla bla bla speech’ without putting forward anything concrete,” he said. “We’ll be back on the streets anyway. There will be one demonstration after another until something changes – every weekend, without a break”.

As France grapples with widespread anger that bubbled over in the form of violent protests last weekend, appetite – at least among the country’s youth – for centrist politics of the kind that Macron represents appears to be rapidly shrinking.

The unrest in France comes months before the country’s 2027 presidential election and has further sharpened political divisions, with parties seeking to present themselves as the answer to the frustration visible on the streets.

The populist-left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon has embraced the student movement with enthusiasm, while far-right firebrand Marine Le Pen has focused on the disorder that came with the demonstrations, framing it as a crisis of security and authority. The centrist Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu has accused the extreme left of instigating violence as a “warm-up round” for the presidential election.

Polling before the election points to a contest in which both the far left and the far right could play a central role. But while the country is demanding change, there is little consensus on what that change should look like. Macron, who has been in power for two terms, will need to step aside after the election, as the constitution bars him from running again.

“Candidates have no choice but to take a stand and address young people,” said political analyst Beligh Nabli, a professor of public law at UPEC-Paris XII. “They have a political obligation to have a message aimed at young people. That message must not be empty, but it will have to answer their demands.”

Since launching their protest in mid-September, students have demanded better schools, more teachers and a more equal system. But the movement quickly spilled out of the schoolyards and into the streets, tapping into broader social and economic anxieties.

The protests have brought these issues to the centre of the political debate in a way that might not otherwise have happened, given young people’s comparatively low electoral participation and the tendency of political campaigns to focus on older voters and issues such as pensions, say analysts.

“If it wasn’t for this mobilisation, it would have been business as usual,” Nabli said. “We would have seen a kind of relative indifference from the candidates towards young people because they are not the social group that mobilises the most in elections, in contrast with those over 60.”

France Unbowed – La France Insoumise (LFI) in French – the left party led by Melenchon, has strongly supported the student movement to the point that critics have accused the party of spurring youth resentment and exploiting the unrest for political gain. Yet the party’s appeal among young voters predates the protests. Its programme addresses several of the movement’s central grievances, including investment in education, teachers’ pay and the abolition of Parcoursup, an online platform students must use for higher education applications that many say lacks transparency.

According to an OpinionWay poll for Les Echos, published on Thursday, Melenchon leads among voters aged 18 to 24, with 49 percent backing him – a 10-percentage-point increase compared with 2022.

For some young protesters, support for Melenchon reflects both opposition to the far right and frustration with the political centre.

“I’m going to vote for La France Insoumise to counter the far right, the National Rally, and the centre, which is basically going to give us a repeat of Macron’s policies,” said Lydia, 21, a student at the Ecole du Louvre who took part in a protest at the museum on Monday.

But she said she was under no illusion that the party would necessarily solve France’s problems. She also criticised what she sees as the demonisation of LFI by critics, arguing that even moderately left-wing positions are increasingly labelled extreme. “It’s becoming rather exceptional to have empathy; it’s becoming something extreme left-wing,” she said.

On the other side of the political spectrum, Le Pen and her National Rally party have sought to make the unrest a question of law and order, accusing the government of failing to be able to control the country, and its main competitor, Melenchon, of stoking violence. Le Pen remains the leading contender in the presidential race with 32 percent of the vote, while the National Rally ranked second among voters aged 18 to 24, behind France Unbowed.

“Yesterday, you saw our cities, our streets, and our country mistreated, battered, and looted,” Le Pen said in a video message on Sunday night. “We are experiencing a profound crisis of trust and authority – one that poses a threat to our democracy.” She added that France was “caught in a vice – effectively held hostage – between violence and powerlessness”.

Caught between these competing narratives is the centrist bloc of Macron, whose presidency began amid the Yellow Vest protests and is now approaching its end against the backdrop of another major wave of social unrest. That earlier movement, initially triggered by a rise in fuel taxes, grew into a broader revolt against the cost of living and what demonstrators saw as Macron’s favouring of the elite.

One of the differences between now and then is that any government coming next will not have the fiscal room to quell the unrest by handing a cheque. Last year, the government recorded a deficit of 5.1 percent of France’s gross domestic product, one of the highest among European countries. By contrast, the European Union average is 3.1 percent. Any future president will have to deal with Macron’s headache: How to save money without deepening public anger.

The current mobilisation has exposed a wider sense of disillusionment with the political establishment. The president’s popularity stands at 15 percent, the lowest ever.

In his speech on Sunday night, Macron blamed “insurrectionists from fringe far-left groups, joined by numerous criminals” for the violence. But he only briefly spoke about the students’ demands and offered no specific new policy measures to address them. Instead, he tasked Lecornu with bringing together students, teachers, unions and elected officials to develop proposals in the coming days, while promising a tougher response to violence.

The unrest presents an opportunity for his opponents to argue that his presidency has failed to address deep-rooted inequalities. At stake is the support of a generation of young people who feel let down by the state and increasingly disconnected from the political establishment – and who all sides of the political spectrum are poised to woo in the coming months before the election.

With more than one million votes counted, about 76 percent supported remaining in Canada.

Alberta residents have voted to remain ⁠part of Canada in the province’s first-ever referendum on separation, in a much-needed win for Prime Minister Mark Carney as he ‌attempts to unify the country amid an ongoing trade war with the United States.

With more than one million votes counted, about 77 percent supported remaining in Canada, compared with 23 percent who backed beginning a process that could lead to separation, early results showed on Tuesday.

The vote was not a direct referendum on independence but would have set oil-rich Alberta on a path towards a future vote on separation from Canada.

Carney welcomed the result and said Albertans had made a “clear choice” in favour of unity.

“They chose unity, to build together, and to take care of each other,” he said in a statement on X.

Jeffrey Rath, a top leader of the secessionist Alberta Prosperity Project, told reporters his push for an independent Alberta will “absolutely” continue, despite the result from Monday’s vote.

“We’ve learned a lot of lessons from this fight,” he said.

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, a conservative, said she voted against independence but called the referendum to settle an issue that has divided the province.

She has said a win for the federalists would close the secession question.

Alberta has the world’s fourth-largest proven oil reserves, and much of the secessionist momentum has been driven by anger over oil industry management.

Smith has blamed Carney’s predecessor Justin Trudeau for igniting the secessionist fire, accusing him of trying to crush oil production to advance his pro-climate agenda.

Alberta’s independence push has also drawn sustained interest from the allies of US President Donald Trump, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who called Alberta Washington’s “natural partner”. Elon Musk, the world’s richest person and eminent Trump supporter, also posted on X that Alberta “should separate”.

Carney, who grew up in Alberta, has worked to improve relations between the province and Ottawa since taking office last year. He has partnered with Smith on advancing a new pipeline to export more Alberta bitumen overseas, a project considered a nonstarter during Trudeau’s tenure.

Mobina Atashi’s £550 package holiday to Bulgaria was meant to be a time to relax, but turned into a nightmare after one “painful” night

A student who says she was left too scared to sleep after finding something crawling in her hotel bed has described how she first thought she had “chickenpox”. A dirty room is enough to ruin a holiday, but discovering you may be sharing your bed with blood-sucking insects is the stuff of nightmares.

Law student Mobina Atashi, 22, claims that’s what happened when she flew out on July 12 for a seven-night Jet2 break near Bulgaria’s Black Sea coast — and ended up leaving early.

Mobina says she didn’t want to kick up a fuss when she first noticed the room was dirty, as she’d arrived late and planned to report it later. But she claims she was soon woken up by intense itching.

In shock, she claims she spotted bed bugs in her bedding and soon noticed angry red welts spreading across her skin — which she documented. Mobina says she was moved to a different room, but claims that one was also grubby.

Mobina claims staff downplayed what happened, insisting the bites looked like an allergic reaction rather than bed bugs.

She says she was left with no choice but to leave early, ending her holiday after two nights and paying an extra £40 to get back to the UK. On her return, Mobina says she complained to Jet2 and asked for a refund, but claims she was told there wasn’t enough evidence to link the bites to the accommodation.

Jet2 said they take concerns such as these “very seriously” and are looking into the matter further. Mobina, from Manchester, said: “I arrived after midnight. The room was very dirty but I decided to sort it out in the morning, it had hair everywhere. After a few hours of sleeping, my body was itching and I was confused. I turned the lights on and there were so many bugs.

“My whole body had red bumps and it got worse after a few days. They were on my breast area, neck, chin, behind my ears, legs and arms. There were at least 20 on my arms, probably 100 in total. It was like I had chickenpox, it was painful and mostly itchy. I made a mistake not to check properly before getting in bed but I was so tired.

“I ran downstairs at 5am and told them to please clean my room as soon as possible. I showed them videos. One of the ladies said they would change my room and gave me a new key. The new room was also dirty. There was hair and yellow stains on the bed.

“There were no bed bugs but I was so scared to sleep that night, after that, I decided I could not stay at the hotel.

She says she reached out to Jet2 on live chat in a bid to get support, only to be directed back to the hotel to resolve it. Mobina said: “I tried to talk to Jet2 through the live chat and they told me I had to talk to the resort.

“The receptionist said it looked like an allergy and that she didn’t think it was bed bugs, but it is. When I got home, I made several complaints for a refund and I didn’t get a response. They replied after three months and called me, they said all they can do is apologise.

“They said they can’t prove the bugs were caused by the accommodation and that my bites could have been caused by something else. I wanted to go on a relaxing holiday because I have anxiety and wanted to relax by myself. I never expected this. I’m traumatised because I’m scared of insects and spiders. If I see a spider, I cry, it’s my worst fear.”

Now claiming the ordeal has left her “scared at night”, Mobina has sworn off booking holidays through Jet2 in future. Mobina said: “I said they need to at least compensate me, but they said there is no evidence. I am so scared of travelling, I will never go solo travelling again.

“I’m scared at night. If my body itches, I think it is a bug. It is so traumatic. I’m never using Jet2 in the future, especially not package holidays.”

A Jet2 spokesperson said: “We’re very sorry to hear about Ms Atashi’s experience. We take concerns like these very seriously and we are investigating in further detail. We will contact Ms Atashi directly once this investigation is complete.”

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A group of parents claims local admission policy boosts Black and Latino students while constraining Asian applicants.

The United States Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case about the role of race in admissions to selective Maryland middle schools after a group of parents claimed policies discriminated against Asian students in favour of Black and Latino students.

The Supreme Court agreed on Monday to hear the parents’ plea on four academically rigorous “magnet” schools in Montgomery County, a suburb on the outskirts of Washington, DC, in the neighbouring state of Maryland.

The high court said it would weigh whether the parent group has enough evidence of discrimination for the case to move forward.

Lower courts previously dismissed the case because Asian-American students were not underrepresented at the specialised-curriculum schools compared with the pool of students that applied.

If the Supreme Court rules for the parent group, the Association for Education Fairness, it could revive the lawsuit.

The court is expected to hear arguments in the coming months and rule by June.

‘The Pandemic Plan’

The Montgomery County school district’s selection process was introduced in the 2021-2022 school year during the COVID-19 pandemic.

It screens all students for academic potential, and then implements a lottery to randomly assign students from that pool to receive enriched instruction at either a magnet school or a local school.

The suit alleged that the screening process makes it harder for Asian-American students, who the challengers said are clustered in “high-performing, low-poverty elementary schools”, to enter the lottery pool.

Part of the process ranks a student’s performance by comparing the student’s test scores against those of other students whose family incomes are at a similar level.

“Under the applicant pool benchmark, the government can set specific racial targets, hit them, and avoid even an inquiry into discriminatory intent,” so long as it has not explicitly called out race in its process, they wrote in their appeal to the Supreme Court.

Previously thrown out

The case was thrown out in 2022 by US District Judge Paula Xinis. She noted that the percentage of admitted Asian-American students exceeded the percentage of Asian Americans among all applicants to the magnet schools.

Xinis also found no evidence that the lottery policy was implemented with discriminatory intent.

The school system has consistently argued the new admissions policy, called the “Pandemic Plan” due to the timing of its release, is race-neutral.

“The Pandemic Plan is a colorblind lottery,” lawyers wrote in a brief asking the Supreme Court not to take up the case. “Nothing about the Pandemic Plan, its history, or its purpose is offensive to the Constitution.”

Supreme Court justices will now consider whether a group claiming to be targeted by a race-neutral policy must show it was disproportionately harmed to prove intentional discrimination.

Student protests in France are into their second month, escalating into demonstrations across Europe.

What began in September in France with pupils protesting against overcrowded classrooms and teacher shortages has grown into wider anger at the cost of living and planned cuts to public services.

Protesters in Albania, Belgium, Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain have also taken to the streets over the lack of affordable housing, rising costs and failing public services – with many young people saying they no longer expect to be better off than their parents.

Facing their anger are leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron, Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Spain’s PM Pedro Sanchez and Portugal’s PM Luis Montenegro. Sanchez belongs to the left, Meloni to the right and Macron and Montenegro are conservative-leaning centrists. But while their politics vary, they all face mounting unrest because of soaring costs of living.

Are they out of touch with the experiences and sentiments of youth in their countries? Al Jazeera visualises how prices, wages, housing and education have changed in France, Italy, Spain and Portugal over the past 26 years, from when Macron, Meloni, Sanchez and Montenegro were in their 20s, much like many of the protesters angry with them.

How much more expensive is it compared to 2000?

The prices paid for everyday items such as food, energy, transport and bills have risen by between 59 and 78 percent since 2000 in France, Italy, Spain and Portugal, according to Eurostat – the European Union’s statistics agency. Its harmonised index of consumer prices (HICP) is the EU’s official measure of how much everyday goods and services cost.

Spain recorded the steepest increase at 78 percent, followed by Portugal at 71 percent, 68 percent in Italy and France at 59 percent.

That means goods and services that cost 100 euros ($112) in 2000 now cost about 178 euros ($200) in Spain, 171 euros ($192) in Portugal, 168 euros ($188) in Italy and 159 euros ($178) in France.

Prices rose by about 2 percent a year on average, but jumped in 2022, when annual inflation hit 8.7 percent in Italy, 8.3 percent in Spain, 8.1 percent in Portugal and 5.9 percent in France, the highest rate in all four countries since at least 2000.

The surge was driven mainly by energy costs, which soared after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. By October that year, eight months into the war, energy prices across the eurozone were almost 42 percent higher than a year earlier, and food prices were also rising sharply, according to Eurostat.

Between 2021 and 2023, prices increased by 12 to 15 per cent in the four countries. Wages failed to keep up, and because prices do not fall back once inflation eases, many households are still feeling the squeeze today.

How have salaries changed?

Once inflation is taken into account, the average full-time wage in Italy fell by almost 5 per cent between 2000 and 2025. Over the same period, real wages rose by 7 per cent in Spain, 11 per cent in France and 20 per cent in Portugal, according to OECD wage data adjusted with Eurostat’s price index.

In Spain most new jobs were in tourism and services, and were often seasonal and poorly paid,  Jaime Velazquez, a journalist in Madrid, told Al Jazeera’s Inside Story.

Julius Fintelmann, cofounder and editor-in-chief of The European Correspondent, said ageing societies were squeezing out opportunities for younger workers, adding that the pay gap between older and younger workers has been widening across high-income economies for decades, so the promise that each generation would be better off than the last no longer holds.

How has the cost of housing changed?

Housing has become harder to afford in all four countries since 2000, according to the OECD’s price-to-income ratio. It provides a broad picture of how house prices have changed relative to incomes over time. When prices rise faster than incomes, the ratio goes up, suggesting homes are becoming less affordable on average.

However, it doesn’t show which households or regions are hit hardest, does not account for mortgage and borrowing costs, and says nothing about the quality of the homes people are paying for.

Spain has seen the biggest change. Its price-to-income ratio is 56 per cent higher than in 2000, even after falling sharply following the 2008 financial crisis.

In France, the ratio is 39 per cent higher than in 2000, though it has eased slightly since peaking in 2022.

Italy is the exception where house prices have broadly kept pace with incomes, leaving the ratio just 5 per cent higher than in 2000.

Portugal has seen the sharpest change in recent years. Its price-to-income ratio fell steadily for 15 years after 2000, meaning homes became more affordable. But since 2015 the ratio has risen by 67 per cent.

The OECD publishes the price-to-income ratio with 2015 as its reference year. To compare it with the wage and price data in this article, which started in 2000, Al Jazeera has reset the figures so that 2000 = 100.

How has state expenditure on education changed?

Education has been at the heart of the unrest in France, where protests began because of overcrowded classrooms and teacher shortages. While in Belgium and Albania, demonstrators have rallied against the rising cost of education and access to universities.

According to the latest data from Eurostat, France’s public spending on education amounts to 5.1 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP) compared to 5.6 per cent in 2000.

Italy spent 4.4 per cent of its GDP on education compared to 4 per cent in 2024, Spain spent 4.1 per cent in 2000 and the same in 2024. Portugal spent 4.8 per cent in 2000 and 4.3 per cent in 2024.

Protests are sweeping France as anger over conditions in schools meets frustration with high living costs and a government accused of doing little to address problems facing people.

About 550,000 people demonstrated nationwide on Saturday, according to the Interior Ministry. Most marched peacefully, while a small minority attacked buildings, looted shops and clashed with police, who fired tear gas and charged protesters.

Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu said 1,200 people were arrested and 150 police officers were injured. Behind the confrontations lies a political crisis, fuelled by anger at deteriorating services and overstretched household budgets, and compounded by a sense that France’s political institutions offer little hope of change.

Here is how school blockades became a nationwide movement – and what that means for President Emmanuel Macron.

How have the protests spread, what are protesters demanding?

The movement began last month in high schools in Paris’ working-class northern suburbs, where students protested against teacher shortages and poor facilities. School blockades and demonstrations later spread to cities including Bordeaux, Rennes, Nantes, Lyon, Lille and Marseille.

Saturday brought together students and trade unions, alongside supporters of the “yellow vest” movement that emerged in 2018 to challenge rising living costs and economic inequality.

Emile Chabal, a professor of contemporary history at the University of Edinburgh, told Al Jazeera the demonstrations were “the logical outcome of a series of protests” stretching back to the yellow vests.

That movement was driven by financial pressures and resentment at “the French presidential system”, he told Al Jazeera, alluding to a structure which often leads to the election of a centrist candidate, such as President Emmanuel Macron.

Saturday combined those longstanding grievances with students’ anger at deteriorating state schools. The yellow vests had demanded better public services.

Bringing students’ grievances together with wider social demands, therefore, represented “the worst possible outcome for the French government”, Chabal said.

Students’ immediate demands concern conditions in France’s lycees (public high schools), which generally educate pupils aged 15 to 18. They want smaller classes, enough teachers, better buildings and less exhausting timetables. Their complaints also reflect broader concerns about whether the state can provide the education and opportunities young people need.

But for workers, including school staff, the dispute also concerns wages and the resources available to deliver public services.

The school protests coincided with a nationwide public sector strike against the government’s budget plans. Bringing all these concerns together under one umbrella represented “the worst possible outcome for the French government”, Chabal said.

It comes as the proposed 2027 budget includes a 54 billion euro ($60.8bn) package of cost-cutting and tax measures, which the government says is necessary to reduce France’s deficit. The proposals include freezing the pay scale used to calculate civil servants’ basic salaries, which unions say would be the fourth consecutive annual freeze.

Donatella della Porta, a sociologist and political scientist, said students were inspiring wider mobilisation around inequality, cuts to public investment and democratic rights, with demands for social welfare spending rather than militarisation.

“They do not want to fight wars; they want a different future,” she told Al Jazeera.

She also linked the movement to young people’s mobilisation over Gaza, with Palestinian flags appearing at demonstrations across several European countries.

How has the government responded?

The government has focused its immediate response on public order, with President Macron saying those responsible for violence would be “prosecuted and punished”.

His comments came as a fire largely destroyed the historic town hall in the city of Limoges, while public buildings and shops were attacked elsewhere.

But those involved in violence represent only a small minority of the much larger mobilisation. Jean-Luc Melenchon, leader of the left-wing France Unbowed party, has accused the government of repressing school students and allowing the confrontation to intensify.

His argument reflects a wider political dispute about whether the government treats the protests chiefly as a security problem or addresses the grievances that have brought different groups together.

Experts say France’s problems extend beyond disagreement over individual budget measures and reflect deeper discontent. Emile Chabal, from the University of Edinburgh, said political paralysis since the 2024 parliamentary elections, which left no bloc with an outright majority, had created “an environment in which no political party or movement is able to channel social discontent”.

That fragmentation makes it difficult to build a durable agreement on spending, taxation or public services. It also leaves protesters questioning whether changing governments produces meaningful changes in policy.

The protests are also “a tough blow for Macron”, Chabal said, whose promises of youthful energy and a reformed, dynamic France have been undermined by “his inability to articulate his political project and his deeply unempathetic persona”.

Chabal added that the unrest included violence sometimes seen on the fringes of French demonstrations, with direct-action tactics associated with the yellow vests. Targets included shops and, more unusually, public buildings. He described the destruction of Limoges’ town hall as particularly significant because of its place in France’s civic history.

Other researchers emphasise the role of policing. Guya Accornero, a specialist in social movements at Lisbon’s University Institute, said previous confrontations had created lasting tensions between protesters and police.

During the current protests, a 15-year-old lost a hand to a police stun grenade, while a 14-year-old suffered a shattered jaw after being struck by a tear gas canister fired at close range, according to Human Rights Watch. The organisation condemned excessive force against children, saying the demonstrations had been overwhelmingly peaceful.

“Young people have been violently repressed also when using non-disruptive tactics,” she told Al Jazeera.

Who could benefit politically?

There is no clear answer from the experts who spoke to Al Jazeera. Paul Smith, an associate professor in French history and politics at the University of Nottingham, believes far-right leader Marine Le Pen stands to gain.

“I see only one beneficiary and that’s Le Pen,” he told Al Jazeera, suggesting the unrest could also damage Melenchon’s presidential prospects.

Chabal cautioned against assuming a far-right gain, but he said fear of disorder had historically benefited conservative or centrist parties in France, including after the 1968 protests.

Le Pen has not entirely dismissed the protesters’ grievances, describing them on X on Saturday as “legitimate social demands”, while claiming they had been “held hostage by the far left”.

The far-right may seek to reap the rewards of public discontent, but experts say it is more likely to channel that anger towards immigration and the scapegoating of migrants, rather than blaming the structures of neoliberalism and capitalism for the protesters’ woes, as Melenchon has suggested.

With a presidential election due in April 2027, candidates face competing pressures, demonstrating that they can restore order while convincing voters they will address the conditions behind the mobilisation.

The challenge, Chabal said, is how to create change in “an environment in which no political party or movement is able to channel social discontent”.

Paris, France – France is counting the cost of a day of unrest after hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets nationwide, in the largest mobilisation since protests over education reforms and the cost of living began last month.

At Place de la Republique, in the heart of the French capital, people on Sunday surveyed the previous day’s destruction in dismay: smashed windows, gutted buildings, looted shops.

“I find it unacceptable – absolutely unacceptable,” said Rabah, who has been living in Paris for more than 70 years. “Back in the day, we also demonstrated, but peacefully,” he said.

Staring at the burned skeleton of what used to be a newspaper stand, 56-year-old Claire was also shaken. “I love Paris so much, and seeing it like this makes me furious,” she said. “It’s absolutely appalling. I’m actually quite overcome with emotion.”

Nearby, the statue of Marianne, the symbol of the French Republic, was covered in graffiti. “Those who sow misery reap anger,” read one inscription.

The student-led protests began in mid-September, caused by grievances ranging from overcrowded classrooms and teacher shortages to systemic inequality and a lack of opportunity.

The movement quickly spilled out of the schoolyards and into the streets, tapping into broader social and economic anxieties.

On Saturday, these complaints converged in a mobilisation that saw a nationwide turnout of 550,000 people, according to authorities; unions and organisers put the estimate at 800,000.

But while the vast majority of demonstrators rallied peacefully, the scale of the violent unrest threatened to eclipse their message. In Paris, there was also heavy use of tear gas and stun grenades by the police, including before the start of the march, which set the tone for a tense day.

“I marched from the 10th arrondissement town hall to Place de Clichy. I was there from start to finish, and it was very peaceful – just all kinds of people, all of them nonviolent,” said Stephanie, a 23-year-old Parisian student.

“But once again, the violence was so spectacular that the actual message – the reasons behind the protesters’ grievances – was never conveyed,” she said.

Macron to address nation

French President Emmanuel Macron, whose second and final term ends next year, will give a televised address to the nation at 18:00 GMT on Sunday after meeting government ministers, his office announced.

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said nearly 1,800 people had been arrested – almost half of them in Paris – and more than 500 police officers, gendarmes and firefighters had been injured in the unrest.

“Protesting is a fundamental right. Causing disorder through violence and in a concerted manner is not,” he said on Sunday.

During Saturday’s protest in Paris, Al Jazeera saw groups of black-clad, masked young men smashing shop windows with what appeared to be golf clubs before fleeing with bags of stolen goods.

In Marseille, France’s second-largest city, dozens of shops were looted and a group of people broke into the city hall before being forced out.

“Students and others have real claims they want to air which no one is listening to now because idiots are smashing everything,” said Benoit Payan, the city’s mayor.

In Limoges, footage showed flames engulfing the city hall as the fire spread through the historic building. Public buildings were also damaged in Bordeaux and other cities.

Police conduct has also come under scrutiny. France’s police inspectorate, the IGPN, had opened 36 investigations into alleged police violence since the high-school protests began, according to figures released by the Ministry of the Interior on October 13. The figure predates Saturday’s demonstrations.

Human rights lawyers have described some of their clients’ injuries as comparable to those seen in conflict zones. These include a minor who has lost his hand, another with his jaw smashed and a third pupil who lost sight in one eye.

“There is an increasingly systematic use of crowd-control measures that would normally be reserved for much more serious situations,” said Christophe Calvao, president of the Paris Young Lawyers’ Union. “This only serves to inflame tensions and make people even angrier.”

The government now faces the challenge of responding to widespread social discontent while trying to pass a budget aimed at bringing France’s public finances under control.

Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu wants to reduce the country’s deficit through spending restraint and tax measures – a move that will likely deepen public anger. Cuts to France’s generous welfare system have traditionally faced strong public resistance.

All of this takes place in a highly toxic political environment as parties harden their positions ahead of next year’s presidential election.

Jean-Luc Melenchon, the leader of the left-wing France Unbowed party and potential presidential contender who has sought to appeal to young voters, accused the government of fuelling the unrest.

“In Paris, aberrant leadership has opened the door to chaos. Those in charge no longer know what to do; the rank and file are afraid and are running wild,” he said.

Lecornu hit back. “This is YOUR political responsibility,” said the prime minister on social media, accusing far-left groups of orchestrating the violence.

Five days of clashes rock Tirana as students join a wider movement demanding Prime Minister Edi Rama’s resignation.

Police in Albania have fired rubber bullets at antigovernment protesters in the capital, Tirana, as violent clashes intensify over demands for Prime Minister Edi Rama to resign.

The clashes continued on Saturday for a fifth consecutive day after high school and university students joined a broader movement against Rama, whose governing centre-left Socialist Party has held power since 2013.

The unrest has brought growing anger over education, unemployment and alleged corruption into a wider confrontation with the government.

Protesters threw stones, petrol bombs and fireworks at police near Rama’s office and elsewhere in central Tirana.

Some set cars and rubbish bins alight, creating burning barricades across streets.

Police responded with tear gas, water cannon and baton charges as demonstrators pushed against security lines.

The AFP news agency reported that officers used rubber bullets for the first time since the demonstrations began.

National police chief Skender Hita confirmed their use at a news conference on Saturday, saying they had been deployed “in a limited manner”.

The Ministry of Health and Social Welfare said nine protesters and four police officers received medical treatment on Saturday.

Hita said 167 people had been arrested over five days of unrest, while 132 officers had been injured.

Seven police officers were also suspended pending investigations into allegations that they had exceeded their authority.

Rama, who is serving his fourth term and has refused to resign, visited businesses damaged during the unrest on Saturday. He promised to listen to students and protect their right to demonstrate, while warning against further destruction.

He also accused his conservative political opponents of encouraging the violence.

Growing discontent

The students have complained about expensive university fees, poor educational facilities and limited employment opportunities, alongside allegations of government corruption.

At the start of Saturday’s demonstration, protesters set fire to a suitcase and threw it into the Ministry of Education’s courtyard. AFP reported that the gesture symbolised their determination not to leave Albania in search of better opportunities.

“We are demanding our rights, our future and a better country,” journalism student Sinan Billa told AFP.

The student demonstrations have added to months of antigovernment rallies organised by the Flamingo movement, which began as a campaign against a luxury tourism development on Albania’s southern coast.

The project is linked to an investment company founded by Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of US President Donald Trump.

The movement has since widened its demands to include Rama’s resignation amid allegations of corruption against his government.

The unrest has also spread beyond Tirana. Local media reported that protesters in the coastal city of Durres damaged a post office and blocked roads with burning barricades, extending the confrontations beyond the capital.

Paris, France – Saturday is a day of many unknowns. That was how the French newspaper Le Monde described it as France braced for possible nationwide demonstrations bringing together high school students, trade unions and “yellow vest” activists.

The protests began in mid-September at a high school in the Paris suburb of Creteil, where students took to the streets over dilapidated buildings, overcrowded classrooms, teacher shortages and what they see as a deeply unequal education system.

Since then, the mobilisation has spread to thousands of “lycees”, or upper secondary schools, across the country. It is now beginning to reflect broader anxieties in a country grappling with a combination of fiscal pressures, economic stagnation and mounting social discontent.

Teachers, trade unions and university students have joined the movement.

On Saturday, some “yellow vest” activists – remnants of the participants in the grassroots cost-of-living protests that shook President Emmanuel Macron’s first term in 2018 – have also called on supporters to join the students.

“High school students are fighting for their future. Workers are fighting to earn a living from their labour. Retirees are fighting to preserve their dignity. Our paths may differ, but our concerns can converge,” Jerome Rodrigues, a prominent “yellow vest” activist, said in a video message released last week that called on people to join Saturday’s demonstrations.

Now France is waiting to see whether those calls will translate into a large, coordinated mobilisation.

Warlike injuries

Authorities have described the unrest as among the most violent in decades, saying more than 900 police have been injured since the start of the protests. But critics argued that although some demonstrators have engaged in violence, they represent a minority and the actions of a few risk overshadowing the grievances of the wider movement.

The government has also faced criticism over its response to the protests, including the detention of thousands of minors and the use of force against young demonstrators.

More than 6,700 children had been taken into police custody since mid-September, according to reports published this week.

Human rights lawyers said several teenage students have suffered warlike injuries.

Two cases have drawn particular attention: A 15-year-old lost his hand in the explosion of a stun grenade outside a school in the northern city of Lens, and a 16-year-old in western Tours lost his sight due to an injury caused by a rubber bullet.

There are fears of further clashes on Saturday.

“This is a moment of fatigue in the country,” Prime Minister Sebastian Lecornu said on Thursday. “We are in an atmosphere of perma-crisis: wars, inflation and issues surrounding purchasing power.”

The government has accused the far-left France Unbowed (LFI) party of inflaming the protests. The party has rejected the accusation.

While France suspended the use of stun grenades for the student demonstrations, Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said on Friday that he authorised police to use them in the event of what he called “urban violence”.

Nunez also said he is expecting a “fairly significant” turnout on Saturday.

Hundreds of protest sites

Calls on social media for members of past protest movements to join the current one have been made for weeks. The website 17octobregiletjaune.net, which tracks “yellow vest” actions, listed more than 1,750 planned protest locations across the country.

The government has tried to quell student anger by scrapping plans to increase some higher education registration fees and promising to deploy 3,000 substitute teachers to high schools. This week, it set up a national online survey for pupils to hear their concerns.

But Mathieu Roger-Lacan, a French literature teacher in a disadvantaged area and author of A Language of One’s Own, a book about the growing language gap, argued that these measures fail to address the deeper problem: an education system that struggles to provide equal opportunities.

“If you have a pool that is leaking, the answer should not be to put more water into it but to work on its structure – and that costs money too,” he said.

For Roger-Lacan, the problem is not simply how much France spends on education but how it distributes those resources.

A government report published this week said that 32  percent of the French education ministry’s budget for next year will go towards funding the pensions of retired civil servants.

Students are not only complaining about deteriorating school buildings and overcrowded classrooms but also expressing a deeper anxiety about their future.

For many, a diploma no longer feels like a guarantee of stable employment or social mobility. That concern is compounded by questions about the quality of education itself amid evidence of persistent weaknesses in French students’ academic performance.

In September, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said that French 15-year-olds’ results in mathematics and reading had fallen to among their lowest levels on record.

“There is a gap between the diploma we give at the end of school, which is given to a huge part of the population, and the reality around us, which is that many of these young students have great difficulties even in writing French,” Roger-Lacan said.

Competing demands

The protests come at a very difficult time for the government, which is caught between demands for better-funded public services and the need to rein in France’s debt.

The government recorded a deficit of 152.5 billion euros ($171.3bn) last year, equivalent to 5.1 percent of France’s gross domestic product (GDP). By contrast, the European Union average is 3.1 percent.

Meanwhile, public debt ballooned to 115.6 percent of GDP, the third highest in the EU after Greece and Italy.

Lecornu’s proposed 2027 budget seeks to reduce the deficit through spending restraint and tax measures, including a freeze on public sector pay and limits on pension increases.

Whether the government can make those savings without deepening public anger is another question.

The debate touches a nerve in France, where the welfare state and access to public services remain central political issues.

Macron’s decision to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64 triggered months of mass demonstrations in 2023, exposing deep opposition to reforms that many saw as unfairly burdening workers.

Now as the government prepares its next budget, it faces the challenge of persuading the public that spending cuts and other savings are necessary without further eroding confidence in public institutions.

The political stakes are high. The budget bill will be debated in a deeply divided parliament as parties position themselves before the 2027 presidential election, which will mark the end of Macron’s presidency.

Riot police clash with protesters for fourth day, as young Albanians protest corruption and poor university conditions

Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama has blamed “foreign hands” for the increasingly violent student-led protests that are calling on him to resign.

Riot police clashed with protesters outside the education ministry for the fourth day in a row, as thousands of young Albanians marched through the capital, Tirana, on Friday to protest government corruption and poor university conditions.

“This is not a student phenomenon,” Rama said in a video address on Friday. He said there were “foreign hands that do not wish for Albania to be at peace”.

Rama insisted that the protest had “absolutely nothing to do with the hardships, problems or legitimate aspirations of anyone who desires a better life”.

Police officers used water cannon and tear gas as demonstrators hurled rocks.

The protests have spread beyond the capital to Elbasan, Shkodra and Korca, where demonstrators broke windows and set fire to rubbish bins, local media reported.

The ongoing escalation follows months of mostly peaceful demonstrations, originally sparked by the sale of part of Albania’s coastline to a luxury resort development linked to Jared Kushner, US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law.

Days of unrest have increasingly targeted banks and government buildings. Protesters hurled bricks and concrete blocks at the education ministry on Tuesday. They also set fire to several buildings across the city, including the prime minister’s office, the finance and justice ministry buildings and branches of several banks.

According to a police statement, 160 people were detained over alleged acts of violence on Thursday evening.

The EU question

Demonstrators are demanding Rama’s resignation, as well as electoral and education reforms.

The prime minister, whose government denies corruption, said he would be ready to discuss rising education costs but rejected the calls to resign.

He said on Thursday, “My responsibility is to listen, address legitimate concerns and keep Albania moving forward.”

His dismissal “would be a betrayal of the Albanians who gave me a strong mandate to complete negotiations on European Union membership”, he added.

Corruption scandals have complicated Albania’s efforts to join the EU. Analysts say the country is a hub for gangs seeking to launder money from drugs and weapons trafficking.

Rama won a fourth term last year on promises to take Albania into the EU, aiming for membership as early as 2028.

A teacher fought the teenage shooter and a parent shot him dead, police say on Friday, a day after four people were killed.

The 16-year-old who killed three children and a teacher at an elementary school in the US state of Oregon was a former special-needs student at the school, police and school officials have said.

Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz identified the attacker on Friday, a day after the shooting at Silver Rail Elementary School, as Griffin J. John II.

He said the teenager attacked a classroom of special-needs students, where all the victims were shot.

Steven Cook, superintendent of Bend-La Pine Schools, said John was not enrolled in the local public school system at the time.

“That classroom was a special needs classroom, and the suspect was a special needs student in that school,” Cook told a news conference.

Krantz said John shot his way through locked doors with a 12-gauge shotgun, firing as many as 15 shots, and had about 44 rounds left when he was killed. Police are still trying to determine how he obtained the gun.

Under Oregon law, a minor may possess a shotgun if provided by a parent or with a parent’s consent.

The shooter’s mother, Shauntai Nickerson, separately told reporters outside her apartment: “I’m so sorry, I wish I could have done something.”

A teacher threw her phone at the gunman, then tackled and fought him, likely saving lives, Krantz said, calling her actions “heroic”. She was not injured.

A 36-year-old father, Kaylub Giamanco, who has two children at the school, then followed the gunman inside and shot him dead minutes after the first 911 call.

US President Donald Trump called Giamanco a “great hero”. “It’s a terrible thing, but thank goodness for a man that had a gun and knew how to use it,” Trump said.

The children killed were aged five, eight and 11, and the teacher was Meghan Lambert, 25, police said.

A seven-year-old child and a 54-year-old teacher were taken to hospital in critical condition.

The shooting is the 28th mass killing in the US this year, according to a database by The Associated Press, USA Today and Northeastern University.

The Gun Violence Archive in the US has documented 369 mass shootings in 2026, defined as incidents in which four or more people are shot.

The Everytown for Gun Safety group has counted at least 100 incidents of gunfire on school grounds this year, with 34 deaths.