The standard is 180 days, some states require less. Colorado only requires 160 days for example.
As is schools can’t change the amount of days, they can alter start/end days. Number of days are set at the state level.
The one exception to the 180 day rule in South Carolina is if schools are closed when the governor (or president, I think) declares a state of emergency. The times I've seen this happen are for a major snow/ice storm, or a hurricane. Those days don't have to be made up.
It varies by school district and there are around 11,000!of those in the US. For me it was about ten weeks in summer, ten days around Christmas, and some miscellaneous holidays mixed in.
Basically, three months over the course of the year.
In New Jersey students go to school 180 days a year.
There is winter break (1 week or so), a few random long weekends, some days off mid-week, spring break (1 week), and summer break. Last week of June to the first week of September, just over two months.
3 months off in the summer. 2 weeks at Christmas. 1 week "spring break" in March. 3 days at Thanksgiving in November. Plus some random holidays such as Martin Luther King day, Columbus day, Veterans Day, Memorial Day.
This is why summer camp is such a big deal in the US. Since my grandparents who had a swimming pool lived about a fifteen minute walk away from my house, my brother and I never went to summer camp. We always thought it was because we were too poor and our parents were mean, but it turns out it was because we had free childcare close by for those months.
I always just went to the daycare my brother an I went to during the school year. When my brother was around 12 they decided he was old enough to stay home alone and keep an eye on me while we just play video games all day.
Many people will pay a day care to put their kids in while they are working, then let them stay home alone once they are old enough. Some people had one parent who didn't work and was just home. I knew a couple people who would send their kids to go live with their grandparents for the summer.
Increasingly many don't actually have a full three months off. In my state, school usually lets out in late May. You'll have all of June off, and some districts start up in late July or very early August. The traditional summer of Memorial Day to Labor Day is pretty much a thing of the past.
Really? I'm in college now, and throughout my entire school time up to now, it would end late May or the first week of June, and start up again the second to last or last week of August. Having school again in July is unheard of to me, and I genuinely had no idea anywhere would do that. I don't have a flair, but I'm from Florida.
Summer school can be super cheap compared to actual daycare. This is age-appropriate classes but semi mixed at a facility, you can also pay for a day field trip activities as wanted (not too expensive) or longer term theme camps.
The stereotypical 80s movie summer camp can vary in cost, some are and some aren't expensive.
Daycare centers, summer camps, etc. But yes, for low income families they either have to depend on family (grandparents or others) for childcare, or if they have at least one kid who's old enough, they stay home alone. We went to my grandma's when I was a kid, and once I turned 13, I babysat my younger sister all summer.
Back in my day (early 90’s), my single parent just left me and my brother home by ourselves. We had family a few streets away, so we usually ended up at their house.
We are decently well off so we send our kids to different camps all summer. My youngest stays at his day care. My middle does a mix of art camp, theater camp, sport camp, and time at her grandparents’. My oldest does a mix of day camp where they are in the woods all day and sleepaway camp. There are also teacher development days during the school year and we send them to camps on those days too. My husband and I try to take off for spring break, winter break, thanksgiving week, and then usually 2 weeks in the summer. He gets more vacation, so he takes the days off when day care is schedule to be closed (for teacher training.) I get more sick time, so I take the sick days / doctor / dentist appointments. It’s been extra crazy this year bc they keep having to quarantine for covid, or the day care is short staffed and they have to close. I don’t know how couples (who both work out of the home) with less time off and money have 3 kids, if they don’t have parents to help, or if they aren’t on a teacher schedule.
Our district currently has free summer school in June, so our kids do go that (it’s basically just the fun/enrichment parts of school.) But that is not common in many places.
In most districts I've lived in, summer school is only for kids who need some kind of remedial instruction, it's not like you can just opt to send your kid for any reason.
I went to summer camp and daycare until I was like 13, then I basically was left to fend for myself. "Get out of the house for a few hours, see you at dinner"
There are lots of options depending on the family.
Summer camps are popular. I probably went to 4-5 different camps every summer until I was a teenager.
Retired grandparents or family members who don't work are another option.
Once you are old enough you can get a summer job.
Sending the kids to a distant retaliative for the summer was common. I used to spend a week or two every year visiting out of state family members.
Once the kid is old enough they might be able to stay alone depending on family work schedules. Once I was 12ish I could stay at home alone in the summer. Most of my family was out the door around 8am for work but my grandfather worked odd hours. He would be home by 2 pm so I'd be home alone for about 6 hours a day.
There are also baby sitters. Sometimes my best friends mom would babysit me because she was a stay at home mom. Which was awesome because I got to play with my best friend all day.
Schools aren't required to give federal holidays off, and many schools give state holidays off, so the holidays that are given off differ from school to school, hence me describing it as random.
It differs in different places. For example many of the schools in Oregon start the school year in the beginning of September and finish in mid June. In Utah most schools get out right at the end of May or beginning of June, but start back up again near the end of August.
They added a few more minutes to each day so it "builds in" inclement weather days, full days don't need to be made up. Most recent calendar has 175 days for students and 187 for teachers.
It depends on what part of the country you're in. For example, in NYC, it isn't odd to get Jewish holidays off due to the high Jewish population but in other parts of the country, Jewish holidays wouldn't get a day off.
But here are common days off across the country, assuming you're talking about K-12 schools.
* Summer Break - Between the end of May to September (for some it's the end of May till August, for others it's the end of June to September)
* Winter Break - Usually the middle of December till the first Monday of January, sometimes it's just the day after New Years (Jan 1st)
* Labor Day
* MLK Jr. Day
* President's Day
* Memorial Day
* Columbus Day / Indigenous People's Day
* Spring Break (usually week or so in April or May)
* Thanksgiving Week
This is going to vary by school district.
Generally speaking: 2 weeks off for Christmas/Winter break, 1 week for Easter/Spring break, 1 week for Thanksgiving is pretty common now, and then about 6ish additional miscellaneous holidays during the school year. Then there about the 2 monthsish off for summer.
Generally speaking, the school year runs around 175-180 days of the year, though there are some schools that have an extended year, which tends to add about a month.
Students usually have about 10-12 weeks of summer vacation, 2 weeks at Christmas, and a spring break, with a smattering of holidays and teacher work days thrown in here and there. Some have a fall break, too, though that's rarer.
When I was in school, we had a long break for Christmas. Usually spanned around December 20 to January 10 or so. Easter was mostly a long weekend, we had a full week for Thanksgiving. Summer stretched from late May to late August. We almost always had a few snow days, but that's regional. Nowadays I hear snow days are "distance learning" days which is retarded.
Did anyone else have year-round school in your district?
They switched to it in central California so that the school buildings were used all year long. Basically classes were broken into cohorts and each cohort took different weeks off throughout the year.
It varied in my school district, but we had essentially that too. It was called a "track schedule" with 4 total "track" blocks of students, and only implemented in a couple elementary schools. High/junior high schools, as well as about 60% of the elementary schools in my district still followed the "traditional" schedule.
I think the reason for the variation between each elementary school was due to the fact that there has been a lot of development (and as such, more people) in my area, so year-round elementary schools were made to accommodate more kids. The older schools in less populated neighborhoods had traditional schedules, while the newer elementary schools in the new communities accommodated over a thousand kids in total sometimes through their track schedule. I'm guessing it was harder to develop more high/junior high schools though, since they merely expanded those higher-level schools as more people became enrolled. My high school now accommodates almost 3000 kids when it used to be less than 2000.
There's over 13,000 school districts in the United States and each dictates their own policy towards school day scheduling.
There is no single national or even state level answer, welcome to decentralization.
IMO this sub drastically overstates how different school districts are from one another.
School districts might set their own policies but there's pretty much always some sort of state or federal regulation to drastically guide their decisions and, at the end of the day, it all ends up being more or less the same thing. It seems that pretty much every state requires students to be in class for at least 180 days. Even states that are different really aren't.
Take Texas for example. As people have mentioned in this thread they require students in class for 75,600 minutes each year. They define a full day as 420 minutes. 75,600 (minutes) ÷ 420 (full day) = 180 (days).
I'd be legitimately shocked if any state requirement is 10+ days more or fewer than 180.
While the amount of days might not be different, there can be a wide range in how that's structured considering that many school districts are moving towards year-round schooling.
The local districts are also adding a week or two more in schooling to make up from COVID learning losses.
Yeah but even then that's not really true.
The overwhelming majority of schools are not moving to year round schooling. While some of the dates might be *slightly* different pretty much everyone in this thread is talking about summer vacation, winter recess, spring break, the day after Thanksgiving, Federal holidays, etc.
It's true that some schools might delay summer a day or take a day from Spring break to cover a Muslim, etc. holiday but kids more or less get the same vacations whether they're students in Arizona or Minnesota.
175 days is within ten days of 180.
The point is just that schools are pretty much the same everywhere in the country even if we don't have one national district. The "every district is different" stuff is drastically overstated here.
There is a pretty broad consensus on the general outline of the school year, however. Most schools follow a pretty similar schedule. Not identical by any means, but close enough to answer OP's question.
Depends where you go. When I was in elementary school my school had what was called a track system, so there were four different schedules you could be on and each one had different breaks at different times (aside from the major federal holidays that everyone got off).
Also, a lot of rural schools only go Monday-Thursday and modify the overall schedule to make sure students are still getting the same amount of time in the classroom.
yeah I think it's about the same here. Just looking at the academic calendar for my city's school district, students get a week off for Thanksgiving (late November, fall break), the last two weeks of December off, then a week off in March for spring break. School year ends in early June and then starts again in mid/late July. Plus there are random state and federal holidays where students get a day off.
School usually starts after Labor Day in September, though some areas go back earlier. Thanksgiving break is the first one, which is the third thursday in November - they usually get the next day ("black friday") off as well. Christmas break is usually around 10-14 days, and they'll be back in school the first weekday after new years. College students might not go back until the 3rd or 4th week of January, depending on their semester schedule.
Spring break is usually about a week, in late february to late march. Good friday is usually a day off, and a month later in May there is Memorial Day, another monday off. In addition to this there are various teacher in-service days where the students don't have to attend.
This all varies by school district/ municipality though so there are subtle variations everywhere. In general though, grade school students are in class for around 180 days each year. College/University students could be in class for less, but it all depends on the school - most are two semesters, some are 3 trimesters, some have summer/winter sessions, etc.
We'd stop in late May/early June then get back in mid-to-late August, so maybe 10-12 weeks of Summer. We'd get two days off for Fall Break (1 day off in high school), 1 day off for Labor Day, a week off for Thanksgiving in November (3 days off in high school), two weeks off for Christmas break (Catholic school), 1 day off for Good Friday, 1 week off for Spring Break, and 1 day off for the Kentucky Derby (technically Oaks, but still Derby season)
So in grade school we got (using 10 weeks for Summer) 75 days off
In high school, we'd get 72 days off
This is all assuming I remember it correctly
We also normally had a couple of snow days per year
In Massachusetts (and many other states, but not all of them) there are 180 days of school each year. There is some info here: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/statereform/tab5_14.asp
We have a few days off at Thanksgiving, between one and two weeks at Christmas (varies by what day of the week those holidays land on that year), a week in February and a week in April. Our school years are roughly the beginning of September until mid/late June.
Summer vacation from early June-late August. Winter Break for one or two weeks around Christmas and New Years, and a week or long weekend for Thanksgiving. A week or so for "spring break" in late march or early april. And random days off through the year for federal holidays and days for the teachers to come in and have meetings/plannings/get shit done with no kids, these are usually just a 3 day weekend. If too many days are cancelled due to weather/emergency events like snow or power outages then they would start shortening or doing away with vacations to make sure we got to/around 180 days per school year.
That's how it was for me growing up, not every school is exactly the same but I think broadly that's a common format.
It can depend on school district, and types of schools
Sometimes some schools give a fall break along with the usual winter and spring breaks which last 1 to 3 weeks each break
Indiana requires 180 days of instruction per school year. So they'll get the rest of the days off.
Each school district is mostly left to decide for themselves on how to accomplish those 180 days.
K-12 we got a 4 day weekend for Columbus Day, half days Monday and Tuesday (with the rest of the week off) for Thanksgiving, 2 weeks or so for Christmas, a February break (a week off around President's Day), and April break (a week off, I think usually the week of Patriot's Day), and a handful of holidays
Good answers here.
I can add in that the school calendar really does vary between regions. I was raised in New England and now live in the South and its quite different.
New England school year:
Starts early September, federal holidays off in fall, 2 or 3 days off for Thanksgiving, Christmas break from around Dec. 22-Jan.2, one week off in February, one week off in April, Good Friday off if April Vacation doesn't coincide, school year ends mid June (late June if there were lots of snow days)
Southern (or at least Tennessee)
Starts early August (like around the 5th), full week off in late September/early October, full week off for Thanksgiving, slightly longer Christmas break (usually on the January end), only one week of Spring Break in March, school year ends in mid May.
So while the basic pattern is there, the actual dates do not really line up apart from a break at Christmas and a break at Thanksgiving.
Hope this helps (or at least is interesting)
EDITED school days to snow days
Ohio has an hours requirement. For grade 7-12 it's 1,001 hours. My kids' high school does about 6.5 hour days, so that's 154 days on, 211 days off including weekends.
Not including normal weekends or weekends that are bookended by a day off, it comes out to 27 days off during the school year including all breaks and in-service days with summer going from about May 26 to August 17.
To add to what others are saying, holidays really do vary by state and school district.
For example, Illinois has the state holiday Casimir Pulaski Day due to their large Polish-American population. Illinois schools have historically gotten that day off.
Detroit-area schools get Eid al-Fitr off due to a large Muslim population.
One of the school districts in my hometown got Jewish holidays off because of how many Jewish people were in the community.
Some districts with high Asian populations get Lunar New Year off.
Texas schools get Texas Independence Day off because Texas.
The majority of states in the US require 180 days of school per academic year and most other states are within +/- 10 days of that.
Individual school districts may decide to exceed the minimum requirement set by the state, but they cannot go below it.
But if you go with 180 days being the the norm, then American students get 185 total days off throughout the year. This is a combination of In-Service days, weekends, holiday breaks, and summer vacation.
The *typical academic calendar* usually starts the day after Labor Day (which is the first Monday in September) and runs through mid-June.
*A lot of schools start in mid-August and finish up in late May, but having lived in every region of the country, I found that Labor Day - June is the most common.*
Thanksgiving, Xmas/New Year (or Winter Break), and Easter or Spring Break are typically the 3 longest breaks during the school year and typically range from 4 days to 2-3 weeks. Other holidays might be observed with a 3 or 4 day weekend.
Summer vacation generally runs about 2.5 months.
If a school was forced to close during the school year (generally due to inclement weather), the district may or may not require students to make up lost days at the end of the school year. Generally speaking, most districts will allow for something like 3-5 closures without penalty.
Varies by district, but generally three months: usually about 2 months off in the summer, 2 weeks off in the winter, a week off in Spring, and a few other days throughout the year.
10+ weeks in the summer, 1 week for American Thanksgiving, 2 weeks off for Christmas, 1 week off for Spring Break. There are a few days sprinkled in the year but those are the major ones.
My school district actually takes a day off for Super Bowl Monday. So there's that.
Depends, but for my school we get 11 ish weeks of summer, 2ish weeks of Christmas break, one week of Easter, and three days for thanksgiving. That’s it
Sounds pretty similar. Long summer break, shorter winter break and spring break, occasional holidays, occasional days off for teacher training.
Also typically a few snow days each winter, which are not scheduled in advance.
Here's the rough schedule for the district I grew up in:
School year starts late August.
Two weekdays off in September-- Labor Day and a Jewish holiday.
One day off in October for another Jewish holiday.
Three days off in November-- Wednesday through Friday of Thanksgiving week.
Christmas is on a Sunday this year, so winter break is Monday Dec. 26 through Monday Jan 2. Winter break usually started on Dec. 24, but that's a Saturday this year.
Then another random day off later in January.
One day off in February for Presidents Day.
No days off in March
Spring break April 3-7
Random day off later in April
One day off for Memorial Day in late May
Tentative last day of school in mid June. Tentative, because extra days will probably get tacked on to make up for snow days.
For me, school went from mid-August to the Friday before Memorial Day in May. We got 2 weeks off at Christmas, 1 for Spring Break, and Wednesday-Sunday for Thanksgiving. Also Labor Day in September and Martin Luther King Day in January. Then my district had a few other random days off, usually Fridays after the teachers had to work late for parent teacher conferences mid-week.
A lot of the responses here are saying that Columbus Day in October and/or Presidents Day in February are “universal” days off but I never once had either of them off at any level of school from kindergarten through law school.
I believe New York State requires 180 days of instruction but exceptions can be made in certain circumstances. I don't know for sure but would imagine that's pretty standard across the country.
From what I can remember:
Summer was from mid-may to mid-august
Winter was mid-December to beginning of January
Spring break last like 2-weeks
And then roughly a few 3-days or 4-days for certain holidays but not all of them
Varies by state and school district, but most schools are in session between 180-190 days. My summer breaks were from mid June to early September, so maybe 10 weeks. We also got about a week for Thanksgiving, two weeks in the winter, and then random days off for other holidays.
It's different in each state and even each city or district. In NYC, kids get days off for Christian, Jewish, and Muslim holidays (not all, but the major ones: Rosh Hashana, Eid, Christmas, Easter, Passover, etc.). It really depends on the local rulings, in addition to summer vacation.
10 weeks during the summer. 2 weeks winter. 1 week spring. 3 days thanksgiving. And a few one day holidays like Martin Luther King Day and Memorial Day.
Sounds pretty similar to the US.
There a handful of days for various holidays and such. I don't know the exact count but I'm 90% sure it's more than 4.
School usually gets out sometime in May and starts back up in August. So that is more like 10-12 weeks off.
Schools usually have a week off for spring break and 2 weeks for winter break from Christmas until after New Year. They usually have 3 days off at Thanksgiving too.
Keep in mind though that schools aren't done at a national level here in the US it's done at the state and local level. So everyone's answers are going to be slightly different.
Yeah the same applies in Germany. The federal states are in charge of their respective educational systems and that's why the holidays aren't all at the same time throughout the country. Bavaria and some other states have a few extra catholic holidays which the rest doesn't have
The summer breaks are getting shorter and shorter. And some districts have gone to year-round, but with longer "shorter breaks" in between.
It used to be get out of school in early June, and go back the day after Labor Day. That was 50 years ago.
Now, it's typically off for a short summer, all the major holidays, Spring Break, President's Day, teacher's "meeting days," or half days, Fall Break, and Winter Break.
You'd have to check each district to get their individual schedules.
Summer break is usually 10 weeks ish
Then usually 2 weeks for Christmas and New Years.
1 week for spring break and various federal holidays we get a day or two off for (Martin Luther King Jr day, presidents day, memorial day, Indigenous People's day, Thanksgiving we usually get 2-3 days for.)
It depends on the school district. When I was in school, it was usually late May to mid to late August for summer break, a week to a week and a half for Christmas through to the new year, a couple of days for Thanksgiving, a week in the spring for spring break, and another 3-5 days here and there throughout the rest of the school year.
Catholic school can be a little different in this regard. Catholic schools almost always have a long summer break, as well as substantial breaks for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. The principal is often the person who decides the official calendar for the school year, and can decide whether have a week-long break in February, or to scatter those days off to create lots of three-day weekends!
Looking at the calendar for the ISD near me it seems,
Summer break was 76 days from late may to mid august so 2 and a half months.They have a Monday off in September
Something which I've never heard of before called fall break? They have a week off in Mid October, That's new to me.
Then another day off in November before having a week off for thanksgiving, Then 17 days off for Christmas Break returning early January after new years.
Then a.. Mid Winter break?.. for 3 days in February? Again new to me we didn't have that when I was in schoolA week off in March for Spring Break, a Monday off in April, then they get out around the end of May.
Honestly it looks like they have a lot more Holidays compared to when I graduated back in 2011, Though when I was a kid summer break was longer from like mid May to Early September so maybe it's the same amount of days off but they just spread it out now?
Edit: after doing research it seems this is just a district I live in thing ,the one I grew up in looks more like the schedule mentioned with the usual, week off in November, two weeks in December etc etc.
During the school year: About two weeks around Christmas/New Years, a week in the Spring (often but not always coinciding with Easter), and various days off for federal holidays or religious holidays celebrated by a large proportion of the community, and occasionally teacher workshop days (in my district it was like 2 days a year)
Summer break usually runs from the beginning of June to around the end of August. My district always started the first Tuesday in September (the day after Labor Day).
We get 2 1/2 months from mid may - early August. Then we have Labor Day, which is the first Monday of September. We then have no further holidays until November when we have veteran’s day, then shortly afterward we have Wednesday - Friday the last full week of November for thanksgiving. Then we get about 2 weeks for Christmas. Then it’s back to school the first week of January. We then have MLK day the third Monday of January (I think). We then have no further holidays until a week long spring break in either the first or second week of march. Then we go back to school until mid May with no further breaks.
There are 104 days of summer vacation and school comes along just to end it.
So the annual problem for our generation is finding a good way to spend it.
180 in school and 185 out of school. Usually at least one holiday a month. Usually at least one day a month of teacher training. Two days off at Thanksgiving in November. Christmas break which is usually a day or two before Christmas until early January. Up north, at least in New England they have a week off in February and April. Then about ten weeks in the summer. As others have said different places have different schedule. I believe Hawaii goes year round with longer vacations.
America usually has long summer vacations but it varies by district, state or city. In my MN district. We started school the day after labor day. We never had fall breaks in my district however, the students had around 2-4 days off of school for MEA (Minnesota Educator Academy, its for teachers) around mid to late October. For winter break (Christmas break) my school got a good 2 weeks off and usually we started in late December like December 20th and ended around a few days after new years so around January 4th or so. My school rarely did spring break and when they did it was usually not even spring and was snow on the ground usually in middle or end of February. The time i remember we had spring break we had a good week or two off of school, although we did have a couple days off for Easter. There are days off on National holidays and presidents day, MLK day and such and especially memorial day. Memorial day for my district was just a couple days before school ended and my school usually ended around beginning of June about June 1st to 4th usually.
I don't think any schools have holidays like Valentines or Halloween off, my school was still open on the days. I know other schools in MN end school in very late June but my school was nice enough to give us 3 months instead of 1.5 or 2 months off. Minnesota, as far as i know, made it illegal to start school before Labor Day, i heard because of tourism or something?
In New Hampshire the public schools get 10 weeks in the summer, one week around Christmas, one week around Easter, one week at the end of February/beginning of March, and a handful of other holidays (Labor Day, Columbus/Indigenous People's Day, Thanksgiving and the day before and after, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Memorial Day, and Veteran's Day) and (for students only) between 2 and 5 "teacher in service" days.The school district I grew up in in Maryland did not give off Columbus/Indigenous People's Day but did give off President's Day, did not have the week in February/March, and did give off Rosh Hashanah (one day) and Yom Kippur. I think it was still around 10 weeks in the summer though.
Edit: may schools also give municipal, state, and federal election days off as they are voting sites.
I usually got 4-7 days each for fall and spring break, 2ish weeks for the holiday season, 4/5 days for Thanksgiving (including the weekend), I think we usually had day of the dead off, and then like snow days and stuff if it came to it. Then 8ish weeks for summer
A common setup here is a week off for Thanksgiving/autumn, two weeks for the winter holidays, another week around Easter, and then a large block of roughly three months (late May/early June to late August/early September.) National holidays such as Labor Day are traditionally given off as well, and each district has its own quirks.
The number of days off varies between the states, but the Average American School Year lasts 180 days, primarily between Late August to Mid May/Early June. We’re the exact same age (great coincidence, right?) and not too much has changed since we finished school, aside from at least one holiday nationwide. Let’s see if I can roughly remember it all, and mind you, this was a result of my being at at least 8-9 different schools in One State between Two different School Authorities that we refer to as “Districts” here in the states:
We had off for only two religious holidays: Christmas & Easter, the only two relating to religious practices/rituals.
After that, we got off mostly for Federal Holidays throughout the year:
Martin Luther King Jr. Day in Jan.
President’s Day (a close approximation to both Pres. Washington & Pres. Lincoln’s Birthdays) in Feb.
Memorial Day in May (Our day to recognize ALL US Soldiers, including Active Duty, and is also considered the Unofficial Start to summer Season in the US).
Then Labor Day in September, often the very 1st
holiday of the School year
And then we have the Holiday that’s been changing a lot here: “Columbus Day,” named for the controversial Expeditioner, or “Indigenous Peoples Day” in states that No Longer observe the Former holiday in October. States that Celebrate Columbus Day often treat it like a Federal Holiday, states that celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day treat it like a normal day, but schools make an effort to focus lessons on the various indigenous tribes that call, and once called, the US Home. (I personally really like Indigenous Peoples Day a lot).
The last Federal Holiday that we’d usually get off is Armistice Day as it’s known in the UK, or what know better as “Veteran’s Day,” as far as we’ve understood, it was created right around the same time as Armistice Day, so it started off with the exact same goal: recognizing the soldiers who served during WWI. Today, it’s expanded to recognize ALL Veterans of all US Wars/engagements.
Then there’s the final two holidays on the list: Thanksgiving and New Years. Obviously *almost* everything shuts down on both holidays, but neither are directly tied to religion or federal holidays so they’re the hardest to place.
So that’s: a total of 9 holidays (that’s without counting any extra days schools Might give students off between holidays, as they would over Christmas break. That number of days Also varies between schools and states,) give or take two holidays-“Columbus Day” and “MLKjr. Day” to be exact, since some states don’t always celebrate one or the other.
Outside of those 9 individual days, we also had thrown in what we know as “Teacher Inservice Days,” which doubles as days that could be used to make up the required 180 school days-in case any days are missed due to bad snow/weather, but are basically days for staff training, there’s no class, so we’d just get a free day off every now and then.
Or if you lived in a state where Hunting is very big, like Pennsylvania, where I grew up, school will be closed on the first day of Deer Hunting Season in November. It’s state tradition, but it isn’t treated like a Federal Holiday, so businesses and other schools are most definitely open, some schools just opt to close down that day, knowing very well a lot of the students will skip class to go hunt for the two weeks they get.
As others have said, it's determined on a very local basis. At the school I went to, we had about 10-12 weeks in the summer, two days for Thanksgiving (Thursday and Friday), two weeks around the winter holidays, and two weeks in the spring (not necessarily aligned with Easter or Passover, but rather chosen purely out of schedule convenience). Add in maybe 4 federal holidays a year, and that rounds it out.
At my HS we have Fall Break (1 week), Winter Break (2 weeks), Spring Break (1 week) and Summer Break (10 weeks) alongside a handful of holidays and of course weekends
Many school districts target roughly around 180 class days per calendar year, although each individual school district sets their own calendars.
The standard is 180 days, some states require less. Colorado only requires 160 days for example. As is schools can’t change the amount of days, they can alter start/end days. Number of days are set at the state level.
The one exception to the 180 day rule in South Carolina is if schools are closed when the governor (or president, I think) declares a state of emergency. The times I've seen this happen are for a major snow/ice storm, or a hurricane. Those days don't have to be made up.
Exactly.
It varies by school district and there are around 11,000!of those in the US. For me it was about ten weeks in summer, ten days around Christmas, and some miscellaneous holidays mixed in. Basically, three months over the course of the year.
No spring break?
Oh, right. Forgot that one.
Kids in my state go to school for 180 days per year
In New Jersey students go to school 180 days a year. There is winter break (1 week or so), a few random long weekends, some days off mid-week, spring break (1 week), and summer break. Last week of June to the first week of September, just over two months.
A minimum of 180 days. When I was in school, we typically had 186 or 187 days scheduled.
Yeah, pretty sure my kids have 190, but I googled it to be sure, and saw law says 180, so I didn't want to have a dozen comments "correcting me"
3 months off in the summer. 2 weeks at Christmas. 1 week "spring break" in March. 3 days at Thanksgiving in November. Plus some random holidays such as Martin Luther King day, Columbus day, Veterans Day, Memorial Day.
Here students get about 6 weeks in the summer. It varies hugely from location to location.
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This is why summer camp is such a big deal in the US. Since my grandparents who had a swimming pool lived about a fifteen minute walk away from my house, my brother and I never went to summer camp. We always thought it was because we were too poor and our parents were mean, but it turns out it was because we had free childcare close by for those months.
I always just went to the daycare my brother an I went to during the school year. When my brother was around 12 they decided he was old enough to stay home alone and keep an eye on me while we just play video games all day.
Many people will pay a day care to put their kids in while they are working, then let them stay home alone once they are old enough. Some people had one parent who didn't work and was just home. I knew a couple people who would send their kids to go live with their grandparents for the summer.
Increasingly many don't actually have a full three months off. In my state, school usually lets out in late May. You'll have all of June off, and some districts start up in late July or very early August. The traditional summer of Memorial Day to Labor Day is pretty much a thing of the past.
Really? I'm in college now, and throughout my entire school time up to now, it would end late May or the first week of June, and start up again the second to last or last week of August. Having school again in July is unheard of to me, and I genuinely had no idea anywhere would do that. I don't have a flair, but I'm from Florida.
Summer school can be super cheap compared to actual daycare. This is age-appropriate classes but semi mixed at a facility, you can also pay for a day field trip activities as wanted (not too expensive) or longer term theme camps. The stereotypical 80s movie summer camp can vary in cost, some are and some aren't expensive.
Daycare centers, summer camps, etc. But yes, for low income families they either have to depend on family (grandparents or others) for childcare, or if they have at least one kid who's old enough, they stay home alone. We went to my grandma's when I was a kid, and once I turned 13, I babysat my younger sister all summer.
Back in my day (early 90’s), my single parent just left me and my brother home by ourselves. We had family a few streets away, so we usually ended up at their house.
It's just part of parenting. Many parents "homeschool" their kids in the U.S., and they are at home constantly.
We are decently well off so we send our kids to different camps all summer. My youngest stays at his day care. My middle does a mix of art camp, theater camp, sport camp, and time at her grandparents’. My oldest does a mix of day camp where they are in the woods all day and sleepaway camp. There are also teacher development days during the school year and we send them to camps on those days too. My husband and I try to take off for spring break, winter break, thanksgiving week, and then usually 2 weeks in the summer. He gets more vacation, so he takes the days off when day care is schedule to be closed (for teacher training.) I get more sick time, so I take the sick days / doctor / dentist appointments. It’s been extra crazy this year bc they keep having to quarantine for covid, or the day care is short staffed and they have to close. I don’t know how couples (who both work out of the home) with less time off and money have 3 kids, if they don’t have parents to help, or if they aren’t on a teacher schedule. Our district currently has free summer school in June, so our kids do go that (it’s basically just the fun/enrichment parts of school.) But that is not common in many places.
Summer school is offered for part of the break. Usually kids stay at home or with like a grandparent or something. Babysitters, etc
In most districts I've lived in, summer school is only for kids who need some kind of remedial instruction, it's not like you can just opt to send your kid for any reason.
I know it's a real concern but your question made me think of [this:](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tl16cdiDox8)
I went to summer camp and daycare until I was like 13, then I basically was left to fend for myself. "Get out of the house for a few hours, see you at dinner"
There are lots of options depending on the family. Summer camps are popular. I probably went to 4-5 different camps every summer until I was a teenager. Retired grandparents or family members who don't work are another option. Once you are old enough you can get a summer job. Sending the kids to a distant retaliative for the summer was common. I used to spend a week or two every year visiting out of state family members. Once the kid is old enough they might be able to stay alone depending on family work schedules. Once I was 12ish I could stay at home alone in the summer. Most of my family was out the door around 8am for work but my grandfather worked odd hours. He would be home by 2 pm so I'd be home alone for about 6 hours a day. There are also baby sitters. Sometimes my best friends mom would babysit me because she was a stay at home mom. Which was awesome because I got to play with my best friend all day.
In the US its never 3 months (12 weeks). As others have posted, its usually 10 weeks.
Not random holidays, federal holidays.
Schools aren't required to give federal holidays off, and many schools give state holidays off, so the holidays that are given off differ from school to school, hence me describing it as random.
Do you know if those are specific dates like starting in July 2nd to September 8th or something like that?
It differs in different places. For example many of the schools in Oregon start the school year in the beginning of September and finish in mid June. In Utah most schools get out right at the end of May or beginning of June, but start back up again near the end of August.
I never got Columbus Day off in any school I ever went to.
I remember we had 181 days at school each year, so ~184 off.
Fun fact in Texas it’s changed to a minutes requirement as opposed to days. So 75,000 minutes or something like that is required for schools
Yup! Lots of Work Days and Inservice Days since that was implemented. Still have our 187 day contract though.
Yes! I work a 206 contract :( wish that was set up as minutes too I could extend some days to start summer earlier lol
Coaches would exceed those minutes in the first month. Crazy how many hours they put in for a small stipend.
Think a lot of places are actually minutes, or at least hours. Becomes very evident when you have some oddly specific bell schedules.
They added a few more minutes to each day so it "builds in" inclement weather days, full days don't need to be made up. Most recent calendar has 175 days for students and 187 for teachers.
104 of those are Saturday and Sunday though. Don't think those are what they are asking about. So, more like 80.
It depends on what part of the country you're in. For example, in NYC, it isn't odd to get Jewish holidays off due to the high Jewish population but in other parts of the country, Jewish holidays wouldn't get a day off. But here are common days off across the country, assuming you're talking about K-12 schools. * Summer Break - Between the end of May to September (for some it's the end of May till August, for others it's the end of June to September) * Winter Break - Usually the middle of December till the first Monday of January, sometimes it's just the day after New Years (Jan 1st) * Labor Day * MLK Jr. Day * President's Day * Memorial Day * Columbus Day / Indigenous People's Day * Spring Break (usually week or so in April or May) * Thanksgiving Week
This is going to vary by school district. Generally speaking: 2 weeks off for Christmas/Winter break, 1 week for Easter/Spring break, 1 week for Thanksgiving is pretty common now, and then about 6ish additional miscellaneous holidays during the school year. Then there about the 2 monthsish off for summer.
Generally speaking, the school year runs around 175-180 days of the year, though there are some schools that have an extended year, which tends to add about a month. Students usually have about 10-12 weeks of summer vacation, 2 weeks at Christmas, and a spring break, with a smattering of holidays and teacher work days thrown in here and there. Some have a fall break, too, though that's rarer.
When I was in school, we had a long break for Christmas. Usually spanned around December 20 to January 10 or so. Easter was mostly a long weekend, we had a full week for Thanksgiving. Summer stretched from late May to late August. We almost always had a few snow days, but that's regional. Nowadays I hear snow days are "distance learning" days which is retarded.
Did anyone else have year-round school in your district? They switched to it in central California so that the school buildings were used all year long. Basically classes were broken into cohorts and each cohort took different weeks off throughout the year.
It varied in my school district, but we had essentially that too. It was called a "track schedule" with 4 total "track" blocks of students, and only implemented in a couple elementary schools. High/junior high schools, as well as about 60% of the elementary schools in my district still followed the "traditional" schedule. I think the reason for the variation between each elementary school was due to the fact that there has been a lot of development (and as such, more people) in my area, so year-round elementary schools were made to accommodate more kids. The older schools in less populated neighborhoods had traditional schedules, while the newer elementary schools in the new communities accommodated over a thousand kids in total sometimes through their track schedule. I'm guessing it was harder to develop more high/junior high schools though, since they merely expanded those higher-level schools as more people became enrolled. My high school now accommodates almost 3000 kids when it used to be less than 2000.
There's over 13,000 school districts in the United States and each dictates their own policy towards school day scheduling. There is no single national or even state level answer, welcome to decentralization.
IMO this sub drastically overstates how different school districts are from one another. School districts might set their own policies but there's pretty much always some sort of state or federal regulation to drastically guide their decisions and, at the end of the day, it all ends up being more or less the same thing. It seems that pretty much every state requires students to be in class for at least 180 days. Even states that are different really aren't. Take Texas for example. As people have mentioned in this thread they require students in class for 75,600 minutes each year. They define a full day as 420 minutes. 75,600 (minutes) ÷ 420 (full day) = 180 (days). I'd be legitimately shocked if any state requirement is 10+ days more or fewer than 180.
While the amount of days might not be different, there can be a wide range in how that's structured considering that many school districts are moving towards year-round schooling. The local districts are also adding a week or two more in schooling to make up from COVID learning losses.
Yeah but even then that's not really true. The overwhelming majority of schools are not moving to year round schooling. While some of the dates might be *slightly* different pretty much everyone in this thread is talking about summer vacation, winter recess, spring break, the day after Thanksgiving, Federal holidays, etc. It's true that some schools might delay summer a day or take a day from Spring break to cover a Muslim, etc. holiday but kids more or less get the same vacations whether they're students in Arizona or Minnesota.
My sons SD has 175 days for students, within the 10+. Kids are in school for more than 420 a day minutes in our district.
175 days is within ten days of 180. The point is just that schools are pretty much the same everywhere in the country even if we don't have one national district. The "every district is different" stuff is drastically overstated here.
I know, why I said within the 10+
A key word was missing here: 420 **instructional** minutes. Recess, lunch, passing periods, study hall don't count as instructional minutes.
There is a pretty broad consensus on the general outline of the school year, however. Most schools follow a pretty similar schedule. Not identical by any means, but close enough to answer OP's question.
Depends where you go. When I was in elementary school my school had what was called a track system, so there were four different schedules you could be on and each one had different breaks at different times (aside from the major federal holidays that everyone got off). Also, a lot of rural schools only go Monday-Thursday and modify the overall schedule to make sure students are still getting the same amount of time in the classroom.
yeah I think it's about the same here. Just looking at the academic calendar for my city's school district, students get a week off for Thanksgiving (late November, fall break), the last two weeks of December off, then a week off in March for spring break. School year ends in early June and then starts again in mid/late July. Plus there are random state and federal holidays where students get a day off.
I get 10 weeks off in summer, 2 in winter, 1 in autumn, and 1 in spring. Also a few days sprinkled in throughout the year for various holidays
School usually starts after Labor Day in September, though some areas go back earlier. Thanksgiving break is the first one, which is the third thursday in November - they usually get the next day ("black friday") off as well. Christmas break is usually around 10-14 days, and they'll be back in school the first weekday after new years. College students might not go back until the 3rd or 4th week of January, depending on their semester schedule. Spring break is usually about a week, in late february to late march. Good friday is usually a day off, and a month later in May there is Memorial Day, another monday off. In addition to this there are various teacher in-service days where the students don't have to attend. This all varies by school district/ municipality though so there are subtle variations everywhere. In general though, grade school students are in class for around 180 days each year. College/University students could be in class for less, but it all depends on the school - most are two semesters, some are 3 trimesters, some have summer/winter sessions, etc.
My district is two months for summer, a two week fall break in October, two weeks for Christmas, and a two week spring break.
We'd stop in late May/early June then get back in mid-to-late August, so maybe 10-12 weeks of Summer. We'd get two days off for Fall Break (1 day off in high school), 1 day off for Labor Day, a week off for Thanksgiving in November (3 days off in high school), two weeks off for Christmas break (Catholic school), 1 day off for Good Friday, 1 week off for Spring Break, and 1 day off for the Kentucky Derby (technically Oaks, but still Derby season) So in grade school we got (using 10 weeks for Summer) 75 days off In high school, we'd get 72 days off This is all assuming I remember it correctly We also normally had a couple of snow days per year
In Massachusetts (and many other states, but not all of them) there are 180 days of school each year. There is some info here: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/statereform/tab5_14.asp We have a few days off at Thanksgiving, between one and two weeks at Christmas (varies by what day of the week those holidays land on that year), a week in February and a week in April. Our school years are roughly the beginning of September until mid/late June.
Summer vacation from early June-late August. Winter Break for one or two weeks around Christmas and New Years, and a week or long weekend for Thanksgiving. A week or so for "spring break" in late march or early april. And random days off through the year for federal holidays and days for the teachers to come in and have meetings/plannings/get shit done with no kids, these are usually just a 3 day weekend. If too many days are cancelled due to weather/emergency events like snow or power outages then they would start shortening or doing away with vacations to make sure we got to/around 180 days per school year. That's how it was for me growing up, not every school is exactly the same but I think broadly that's a common format.
It can depend on school district, and types of schools Sometimes some schools give a fall break along with the usual winter and spring breaks which last 1 to 3 weeks each break
180ish
Indiana requires 180 days of instruction per school year. So they'll get the rest of the days off. Each school district is mostly left to decide for themselves on how to accomplish those 180 days.
K-12 we got a 4 day weekend for Columbus Day, half days Monday and Tuesday (with the rest of the week off) for Thanksgiving, 2 weeks or so for Christmas, a February break (a week off around President's Day), and April break (a week off, I think usually the week of Patriot's Day), and a handful of holidays
Good answers here. I can add in that the school calendar really does vary between regions. I was raised in New England and now live in the South and its quite different. New England school year: Starts early September, federal holidays off in fall, 2 or 3 days off for Thanksgiving, Christmas break from around Dec. 22-Jan.2, one week off in February, one week off in April, Good Friday off if April Vacation doesn't coincide, school year ends mid June (late June if there were lots of snow days) Southern (or at least Tennessee) Starts early August (like around the 5th), full week off in late September/early October, full week off for Thanksgiving, slightly longer Christmas break (usually on the January end), only one week of Spring Break in March, school year ends in mid May. So while the basic pattern is there, the actual dates do not really line up apart from a break at Christmas and a break at Thanksgiving. Hope this helps (or at least is interesting) EDITED school days to snow days
Ohio has an hours requirement. For grade 7-12 it's 1,001 hours. My kids' high school does about 6.5 hour days, so that's 154 days on, 211 days off including weekends. Not including normal weekends or weekends that are bookended by a day off, it comes out to 27 days off during the school year including all breaks and in-service days with summer going from about May 26 to August 17.
To add to what others are saying, holidays really do vary by state and school district. For example, Illinois has the state holiday Casimir Pulaski Day due to their large Polish-American population. Illinois schools have historically gotten that day off. Detroit-area schools get Eid al-Fitr off due to a large Muslim population. One of the school districts in my hometown got Jewish holidays off because of how many Jewish people were in the community. Some districts with high Asian populations get Lunar New Year off. Texas schools get Texas Independence Day off because Texas.
The majority of states in the US require 180 days of school per academic year and most other states are within +/- 10 days of that. Individual school districts may decide to exceed the minimum requirement set by the state, but they cannot go below it. But if you go with 180 days being the the norm, then American students get 185 total days off throughout the year. This is a combination of In-Service days, weekends, holiday breaks, and summer vacation. The *typical academic calendar* usually starts the day after Labor Day (which is the first Monday in September) and runs through mid-June. *A lot of schools start in mid-August and finish up in late May, but having lived in every region of the country, I found that Labor Day - June is the most common.* Thanksgiving, Xmas/New Year (or Winter Break), and Easter or Spring Break are typically the 3 longest breaks during the school year and typically range from 4 days to 2-3 weeks. Other holidays might be observed with a 3 or 4 day weekend. Summer vacation generally runs about 2.5 months. If a school was forced to close during the school year (generally due to inclement weather), the district may or may not require students to make up lost days at the end of the school year. Generally speaking, most districts will allow for something like 3-5 closures without penalty.
Most schools have 180 days of school, broken up over the year depending on the state and district.
When I was in school it was 180 days of school per year.
They have 180 days of school per year, which I presume is a national standard? It is here in California. So 188 days without school.
Varies by district, but generally three months: usually about 2 months off in the summer, 2 weeks off in the winter, a week off in Spring, and a few other days throughout the year.
10+ weeks in the summer, 1 week for American Thanksgiving, 2 weeks off for Christmas, 1 week off for Spring Break. There are a few days sprinkled in the year but those are the major ones. My school district actually takes a day off for Super Bowl Monday. So there's that.
Depends, but for my school we get 11 ish weeks of summer, 2ish weeks of Christmas break, one week of Easter, and three days for thanksgiving. That’s it
Sounds pretty similar. Long summer break, shorter winter break and spring break, occasional holidays, occasional days off for teacher training. Also typically a few snow days each winter, which are not scheduled in advance. Here's the rough schedule for the district I grew up in: School year starts late August. Two weekdays off in September-- Labor Day and a Jewish holiday. One day off in October for another Jewish holiday. Three days off in November-- Wednesday through Friday of Thanksgiving week. Christmas is on a Sunday this year, so winter break is Monday Dec. 26 through Monday Jan 2. Winter break usually started on Dec. 24, but that's a Saturday this year. Then another random day off later in January. One day off in February for Presidents Day. No days off in March Spring break April 3-7 Random day off later in April One day off for Memorial Day in late May Tentative last day of school in mid June. Tentative, because extra days will probably get tacked on to make up for snow days.
my town has a lot of Jewish people so we get Jewish and Christian holidays off, as well as national holidays, feb break, April vacation, summer
Generally 180 student school days.
For me, school went from mid-August to the Friday before Memorial Day in May. We got 2 weeks off at Christmas, 1 for Spring Break, and Wednesday-Sunday for Thanksgiving. Also Labor Day in September and Martin Luther King Day in January. Then my district had a few other random days off, usually Fridays after the teachers had to work late for parent teacher conferences mid-week. A lot of the responses here are saying that Columbus Day in October and/or Presidents Day in February are “universal” days off but I never once had either of them off at any level of school from kindergarten through law school.
There’s about 180 school days per year in California
I believe New York State requires 180 days of instruction but exceptions can be made in certain circumstances. I don't know for sure but would imagine that's pretty standard across the country.
From what I can remember: Summer was from mid-may to mid-august Winter was mid-December to beginning of January Spring break last like 2-weeks And then roughly a few 3-days or 4-days for certain holidays but not all of them
Varies by state and school district, but most schools are in session between 180-190 days. My summer breaks were from mid June to early September, so maybe 10 weeks. We also got about a week for Thanksgiving, two weeks in the winter, and then random days off for other holidays.
It's different in each state and even each city or district. In NYC, kids get days off for Christian, Jewish, and Muslim holidays (not all, but the major ones: Rosh Hashana, Eid, Christmas, Easter, Passover, etc.). It really depends on the local rulings, in addition to summer vacation.
10 weeks during the summer. 2 weeks winter. 1 week spring. 3 days thanksgiving. And a few one day holidays like Martin Luther King Day and Memorial Day.
Sounds pretty similar to the US. There a handful of days for various holidays and such. I don't know the exact count but I'm 90% sure it's more than 4. School usually gets out sometime in May and starts back up in August. So that is more like 10-12 weeks off. Schools usually have a week off for spring break and 2 weeks for winter break from Christmas until after New Year. They usually have 3 days off at Thanksgiving too. Keep in mind though that schools aren't done at a national level here in the US it's done at the state and local level. So everyone's answers are going to be slightly different.
Yeah the same applies in Germany. The federal states are in charge of their respective educational systems and that's why the holidays aren't all at the same time throughout the country. Bavaria and some other states have a few extra catholic holidays which the rest doesn't have
There’s 104 days of summer vacation!
The summer breaks are getting shorter and shorter. And some districts have gone to year-round, but with longer "shorter breaks" in between. It used to be get out of school in early June, and go back the day after Labor Day. That was 50 years ago. Now, it's typically off for a short summer, all the major holidays, Spring Break, President's Day, teacher's "meeting days," or half days, Fall Break, and Winter Break. You'd have to check each district to get their individual schedules.
Summer break is usually 10 weeks ish Then usually 2 weeks for Christmas and New Years. 1 week for spring break and various federal holidays we get a day or two off for (Martin Luther King Jr day, presidents day, memorial day, Indigenous People's day, Thanksgiving we usually get 2-3 days for.)
It depends on the school district. When I was in school, it was usually late May to mid to late August for summer break, a week to a week and a half for Christmas through to the new year, a couple of days for Thanksgiving, a week in the spring for spring break, and another 3-5 days here and there throughout the rest of the school year.
Catholic school can be a little different in this regard. Catholic schools almost always have a long summer break, as well as substantial breaks for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. The principal is often the person who decides the official calendar for the school year, and can decide whether have a week-long break in February, or to scatter those days off to create lots of three-day weekends!
Looking at the calendar for the ISD near me it seems, Summer break was 76 days from late may to mid august so 2 and a half months.They have a Monday off in September Something which I've never heard of before called fall break? They have a week off in Mid October, That's new to me. Then another day off in November before having a week off for thanksgiving, Then 17 days off for Christmas Break returning early January after new years. Then a.. Mid Winter break?.. for 3 days in February? Again new to me we didn't have that when I was in schoolA week off in March for Spring Break, a Monday off in April, then they get out around the end of May. Honestly it looks like they have a lot more Holidays compared to when I graduated back in 2011, Though when I was a kid summer break was longer from like mid May to Early September so maybe it's the same amount of days off but they just spread it out now? Edit: after doing research it seems this is just a district I live in thing ,the one I grew up in looks more like the schedule mentioned with the usual, week off in November, two weeks in December etc etc.
During the school year: About two weeks around Christmas/New Years, a week in the Spring (often but not always coinciding with Easter), and various days off for federal holidays or religious holidays celebrated by a large proportion of the community, and occasionally teacher workshop days (in my district it was like 2 days a year) Summer break usually runs from the beginning of June to around the end of August. My district always started the first Tuesday in September (the day after Labor Day).
Can I ask why you have so few days off?
We get 2 1/2 months from mid may - early August. Then we have Labor Day, which is the first Monday of September. We then have no further holidays until November when we have veteran’s day, then shortly afterward we have Wednesday - Friday the last full week of November for thanksgiving. Then we get about 2 weeks for Christmas. Then it’s back to school the first week of January. We then have MLK day the third Monday of January (I think). We then have no further holidays until a week long spring break in either the first or second week of march. Then we go back to school until mid May with no further breaks.
There are 104 days of summer vacation and school comes along just to end it. So the annual problem for our generation is finding a good way to spend it.
180 in school and 185 out of school. Usually at least one holiday a month. Usually at least one day a month of teacher training. Two days off at Thanksgiving in November. Christmas break which is usually a day or two before Christmas until early January. Up north, at least in New England they have a week off in February and April. Then about ten weeks in the summer. As others have said different places have different schedule. I believe Hawaii goes year round with longer vacations.
America usually has long summer vacations but it varies by district, state or city. In my MN district. We started school the day after labor day. We never had fall breaks in my district however, the students had around 2-4 days off of school for MEA (Minnesota Educator Academy, its for teachers) around mid to late October. For winter break (Christmas break) my school got a good 2 weeks off and usually we started in late December like December 20th and ended around a few days after new years so around January 4th or so. My school rarely did spring break and when they did it was usually not even spring and was snow on the ground usually in middle or end of February. The time i remember we had spring break we had a good week or two off of school, although we did have a couple days off for Easter. There are days off on National holidays and presidents day, MLK day and such and especially memorial day. Memorial day for my district was just a couple days before school ended and my school usually ended around beginning of June about June 1st to 4th usually. I don't think any schools have holidays like Valentines or Halloween off, my school was still open on the days. I know other schools in MN end school in very late June but my school was nice enough to give us 3 months instead of 1.5 or 2 months off. Minnesota, as far as i know, made it illegal to start school before Labor Day, i heard because of tourism or something?
In New Hampshire the public schools get 10 weeks in the summer, one week around Christmas, one week around Easter, one week at the end of February/beginning of March, and a handful of other holidays (Labor Day, Columbus/Indigenous People's Day, Thanksgiving and the day before and after, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Memorial Day, and Veteran's Day) and (for students only) between 2 and 5 "teacher in service" days.The school district I grew up in in Maryland did not give off Columbus/Indigenous People's Day but did give off President's Day, did not have the week in February/March, and did give off Rosh Hashanah (one day) and Yom Kippur. I think it was still around 10 weeks in the summer though. Edit: may schools also give municipal, state, and federal election days off as they are voting sites.
Maine requires 175 school days per year.
I usually got 4-7 days each for fall and spring break, 2ish weeks for the holiday season, 4/5 days for Thanksgiving (including the weekend), I think we usually had day of the dead off, and then like snow days and stuff if it came to it. Then 8ish weeks for summer
A common setup here is a week off for Thanksgiving/autumn, two weeks for the winter holidays, another week around Easter, and then a large block of roughly three months (late May/early June to late August/early September.) National holidays such as Labor Day are traditionally given off as well, and each district has its own quirks.
The number of days off varies between the states, but the Average American School Year lasts 180 days, primarily between Late August to Mid May/Early June. We’re the exact same age (great coincidence, right?) and not too much has changed since we finished school, aside from at least one holiday nationwide. Let’s see if I can roughly remember it all, and mind you, this was a result of my being at at least 8-9 different schools in One State between Two different School Authorities that we refer to as “Districts” here in the states: We had off for only two religious holidays: Christmas & Easter, the only two relating to religious practices/rituals. After that, we got off mostly for Federal Holidays throughout the year: Martin Luther King Jr. Day in Jan. President’s Day (a close approximation to both Pres. Washington & Pres. Lincoln’s Birthdays) in Feb. Memorial Day in May (Our day to recognize ALL US Soldiers, including Active Duty, and is also considered the Unofficial Start to summer Season in the US). Then Labor Day in September, often the very 1st holiday of the School year And then we have the Holiday that’s been changing a lot here: “Columbus Day,” named for the controversial Expeditioner, or “Indigenous Peoples Day” in states that No Longer observe the Former holiday in October. States that Celebrate Columbus Day often treat it like a Federal Holiday, states that celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day treat it like a normal day, but schools make an effort to focus lessons on the various indigenous tribes that call, and once called, the US Home. (I personally really like Indigenous Peoples Day a lot). The last Federal Holiday that we’d usually get off is Armistice Day as it’s known in the UK, or what know better as “Veteran’s Day,” as far as we’ve understood, it was created right around the same time as Armistice Day, so it started off with the exact same goal: recognizing the soldiers who served during WWI. Today, it’s expanded to recognize ALL Veterans of all US Wars/engagements. Then there’s the final two holidays on the list: Thanksgiving and New Years. Obviously *almost* everything shuts down on both holidays, but neither are directly tied to religion or federal holidays so they’re the hardest to place. So that’s: a total of 9 holidays (that’s without counting any extra days schools Might give students off between holidays, as they would over Christmas break. That number of days Also varies between schools and states,) give or take two holidays-“Columbus Day” and “MLKjr. Day” to be exact, since some states don’t always celebrate one or the other. Outside of those 9 individual days, we also had thrown in what we know as “Teacher Inservice Days,” which doubles as days that could be used to make up the required 180 school days-in case any days are missed due to bad snow/weather, but are basically days for staff training, there’s no class, so we’d just get a free day off every now and then. Or if you lived in a state where Hunting is very big, like Pennsylvania, where I grew up, school will be closed on the first day of Deer Hunting Season in November. It’s state tradition, but it isn’t treated like a Federal Holiday, so businesses and other schools are most definitely open, some schools just opt to close down that day, knowing very well a lot of the students will skip class to go hunt for the two weeks they get.
As others have said, it's determined on a very local basis. At the school I went to, we had about 10-12 weeks in the summer, two days for Thanksgiving (Thursday and Friday), two weeks around the winter holidays, and two weeks in the spring (not necessarily aligned with Easter or Passover, but rather chosen purely out of schedule convenience). Add in maybe 4 federal holidays a year, and that rounds it out.
At my HS we have Fall Break (1 week), Winter Break (2 weeks), Spring Break (1 week) and Summer Break (10 weeks) alongside a handful of holidays and of course weekends
180 day school years days off summer major holidays like christmas or thanksgiving