More than 1,000 students at Xiapu County No. 1 High School in Ningde, Fujian Province, staged protests on Sept. 23 and 24 over evening study sessions scheduled immediately before China’s Mid-Autumn Festival holiday.
According to Yesterday, an overseas project that documents collective protests in China, students demonstrated on two consecutive days, chanting from school buildings and dormitories and at one point marching on campus. The students were demanding that the school cancel evening study sessions before the holiday.
China’s State Council had designated Sept. 25–27 as the country’s official three-day Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, according to the government’s 2026 holiday schedule.
The students did not succeed in getting the evening sessions canceled.
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Students chant and march on campus
The first protest began during evening study hall on Sept. 23, according to accounts collected by Yesterday from students who said they participated.
Some first- and second-year high school students began applauding in unison, banging on railings, chanting “Go home!” and singing “The March of the Volunteers,” China’s national anthem.
The protest then spread to senior students and several school buildings, with applause and shouting reportedly heard across much of the campus. After returning to their dormitories, some male students continued banging on basins and railings.
The demonstration gradually ended after 11 p.m. as school personnel intervened, according to the student accounts.
Students resumed their protest during a long break after second period on Sept. 24. Some students were reportedly taken away from the gathering by grade-level supervisors and the director of the school’s security office.
At one point, students surrounded school officials, who agreed to report their concerns to higher authorities, according to Yesterday.
The school subsequently threatened protest leaders with disciplinary action and stationed grade-level supervisors and security personnel on individual floors to prevent students from gathering again, according to the report. By that evening, only scattered protests continued.
One student revealed: “Over a thousand students protested. They shouted from their dorm rooms, demanding to go home. They sang the national anthem and held a march.”
The students’ central demand was that the school cancel evening study sessions immediately before the holiday, allowing boarding students to leave campus and return home earlier. Student representatives reportedly communicated directly with school officials, but the evening sessions remained in place.
Vision Times was unable to locate a public statement from Xiapu No. 1 High School addressing the student protests or the allegations concerning disciplinary measures.
Xiapu No. 1 High School is one of the region’s oldest schools. A profile published by Xiamen University says the school was founded in 1902 and has more than 3,000 students and more than 300 faculty and staff members.
Similar protests emerge ahead of Mid-Autumn Festival
The Xiapu demonstrations came amid other student protests over holiday schedules and school management in China.
On Sept. 23, students at Anyue High School in Anyue County, Ziyang, Sichuan Province, protested after the school reportedly planned to give students only one daytime period off for the Mid-Autumn Festival.
According to a separate report by Yesterday documenting the protest, large numbers of students gathered in the dormitory area to “shout from building to building” in protest. A student representative reportedly left the campus and delivered a speech on a nearby road while other students cheered.
The following day, the school administration restored a three-day Mid-Autumn Festival break, according to the report.
Another protest occurred on Sept. 24 at Kangjie High School in Yuncheng, Shanxi Province. Students dissatisfied with Principal Yan Zongmin’s management style reportedly posted signs around the campus carrying slogans including “Yan Zongmin Oppresses Students” and “Fight for Human Rights.”
Student protests over school rules reported across China
The September incidents follow a series of student demonstrations over vacation schedules, campus restrictions and school management during 2025 and 2026.
On July 10, hundreds of first-year students at Anlu No. 1 Senior High School in Hubei Province walked out of class after the school reduced what students said had originally been a 20-day summer break to about four and a half days.
Students marched through the campus carrying signs and a banner that included the words “Oppose authoritarianism, advocate equality.” One student challenged school officials by asking, “Why do people rebel every year?”
The school eventually canceled its summer tutoring plan, according to Yesterday’s account of the July 10 demonstration.
On the evening of May 29, students at Yangxin County Experimental High School in Hubei Province protested what they described as strict school controls. Videos posted online showed students singing the song ‘Flower of Freedom’ from classroom windows and throwing pieces of paper bearing handwritten messages from the building.
The papers covered portions of the lawn below. One photographed message read: “No freedom, rather death.” The footage was circulated by Chinese protest-monitoring social media accounts.
Several days earlier, from the evening of May 26 into the early morning of May 27, students at Guangxi Sports College in Nanning and Guilin University of Aerospace Technology in Guilin reportedly sang through the night after prolonged power outages left dormitories without electricity in temperatures of around 86°F (30°C).
The protests and power outages were documented by Yesterday in a May 26–27 report.
Another large student action occurred on May 16 at Wenshang County No. 1 High School in Jining, Shandong Province.
According to Yesterday’s detailed account of the incident, students learned the previous afternoon that weekend dismissal would be moved from 3:50 p.m. to 5:50 p.m. Students organized that night, and at about 9:50 a.m. the following day, students on the third floor of an academic building left their classrooms and gathered in the school plaza.
More than 2,000 first- and second-year high school students eventually joined the protest, according to the report.
During the demonstration, one student raised a banner previously used in a historical play bearing the words “Fight for sovereignty abroad; eliminate traitors at home,” prompting cheers from the crowd.
After about 45 minutes, the school administration reversed its decision and restored the original 3:50 p.m. dismissal time. Students then returned to class.
Similar demonstrations were reported throughout 2025
On Oct. 16, 2025, thousands of students at Yulin No. 1 Vocational Secondary School in Guangxi gathered on campus to protest new restrictions on mobile phone use. Under the policy, students were permitted to use their phones for only three hours each day and were required to surrender them to the school at other times, according to Yesterday’s report on the protest.
On the night of Sept. 11, 2025, hundreds of students at Yizhong Middle School in Zunhua, Hebei Province, protested changes to the school’s holiday schedule and requirements that students remain on campus. Videos and accounts of the demonstration were circulated by the protest-monitoring account Li Laoshi and other overseas platforms.
Four days earlier, on Sept. 7, students at Weining Secondary Vocational and Technical School in Bijie, Guizhou Province, protested a school policy requiring students to turn over their mobile phones. Some students threw books and furniture from dormitory windows and damaged school property as the demonstration escalated, according to reports and videos circulated online.
On May 25, 2025, crowds of students and local residents gathered outside Xuchang No. 6 Middle School in Henan Province after a female student died following a fall from a school building on May 23. Reports citing local residents alleged that the student had been subjected to corporal punishment before her death. Some protesters later damaged school property, and students were reportedly detained.
Earlier that year, on Jan. 18, thousands of students at Chushui Experimental Middle School, Xinghua Middle School and Xinghua No. 1 Middle School in Xinghua, Jiangsu Province, protested plans for winter-break supplementary classes.
The protests ultimately prompted the schools to cancel the planned classes, according to both Yesterday’s documentation of the demonstrations and subsequent reports.
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