Education: France is expected to lose 1.7 million students by 2035, a “seismic wave” according to Geffray

Public or private schools, colleges and high schools under contract will have lost nearly 1.7 million students in 2035, according to projections from the Ministry of Education. This “seismic wave” will require a rethinking of “educational provision in the region in the long term,” said the Minister of Education Édouard Geffray. According to a document from the ministry’s statistical service published Tuesday, this represents a 14% drop in the number of students. It bases its projections on fertility hypotheses.

“The entire educational system will be impacted” by this “extremely large movement which will affect the entire territory”, despite “fairly strong national disparities”, requiring us to “reflect on this what should be the educational offer in the territory in the long term”, estimates the minister in an interview with Parisian. If “next year again, we will not close any school without the agreement of the mayor”, “taking into account these figures, this principle is intended to be combined differently”, warns the Minister of Education.

If “in rural areas, there can be intercommunal educational groupings”, on the other hand “in urban areas, we will have to question the network”, continues Édouard Geffray, in particular in Paris, with the “network of schools, colleges and extremely dense high schools” and “which will lose 30% of its students in ten years, this requires adaptation”.

Teaching job cuts on the horizon

For Sophie Vénititay, general secretary of Snes-FSU, majority in the second level, these projections “should not serve as an alibi” for “a multi-year programming law for job cuts”. “We cannot blindly follow the demographic compass”, due to “social inequalities”, a profession which “has become more complex”, a “need for more adults alongside the youth,” she told AFP, while it will be necessary to replace “300,000 teachers” who will retire “by 2030” according to a 2025 Dares study.

Aurélie Gagnier, general secretary of SNUipp-FSU, the leading primary school union, believes that not eliminating positions would “reduce the number of students per class”. In the event of “inevitable closure”, a redeployment towards specialized education (RASED) would be desirable, she told AFP.

In total, 4,000 teaching job cuts, public and private combined, are expected for the start of the 2026 school year, which has sparked mobilizations across the country for several weeks. Not eliminating positions would amount to “postponing the troubles for my successors,” he said. Parisian Édouard Geffray who arranged to meet the unions on April 21 for a first meeting.