The school holiday calendar has remained relatively unchanged for decades - but is it time for a shake up? According to a report, both students and teachers would benefit from a reorgansiation of term dates to include a shorter summer break and longer half terms. We sent out camera crews around the country to find out what you think.
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00:00 Shortened? I don't know if shortening them would do much for the mental health of anybody
00:10 really. I think holidays are good. You need a rest period. So I think maybe a longer holiday
00:16 if anything.
00:17 I don't think it would improve the lives of students. The more longer holidays, the better
00:22 for them, surely. But no, I think they're too long actually, personally. But when I
00:28 was a kid, I never thought that.
00:29 Like in parents, it might be quite difficult to cover the full six-week period and reducing
00:34 that might just really reduce the burden on them. And also, I think at the moment, a lot
00:38 of children are quite behind because of COVID and other things that have affected education.
00:43 So a bit of a smaller break might be better so they don't have such a large break between
00:48 learning something and going back and maybe forgetting it or not progressing further.
00:52 The Nuffield Foundation, who say the school holiday calendar has remained unchanged since
00:56 the Victorian era, will publish their report next month into education inequalities that
01:00 have developed since the pandemic. Their experts are now suggesting that one low-cost and effective
01:05 way to tackle the educational divides would be to spread school holidays more evenly across
01:10 the year. Their proposal would see summer holidays in state schools reduced from six
01:14 weeks to four, while half-term breaks in autumn and winter could each be extended from one
01:19 week to two. Would you support the change and why?
01:22 I don't know why. Is it to help the parents so they don't have to have childcare or take
01:28 time off? No, because I enjoyed my children's six weeks because I always had things for
01:33 them to do. They were never bored. So no, I don't think they should be shortened.
01:36 I don't think shortening the school holidays is the answer to that. I mean, even from the
01:39 kids' perspective, I loved the six-weeks holidays when I was a kid. So certainly, I'd say no,
01:44 that's not the answer. I think it's probably a very political answer, isn't it? What can
01:49 we do? What's the easiest thing we can do to shorten the school holidays?
01:51 I think it would be a good move, yeah. I think it does need to be shortened. I think six
01:55 weeks is probably a bit too long. I'd even say four weeks is probably too long. I think
01:59 it's probably better for kids the more they're in school.
02:03 No.
02:04 Because you like the big long holidays?
02:05 I like the big long holiday. Yeah, yeah, no. What do you think?
02:10 I think that it's very nice for teachers to have another life and six weeks gives them
02:16 another life.
02:17 Yes. I mean, personally, I think that the summer is the time when you can really enjoy
02:21 being outside. And that's why, you know, in Europe, they have much longer school summer
02:27 holidays. I think it's really good for children to spend time out of institutions. You know,
02:32 I think being too institutionalised is not a good thing.
02:36 When it comes to education, I can see on that end that there would be a pro to shortening
02:42 the summer holidays.
02:43 I suppose six weeks gives everybody an opportunity to go on holiday. If you've only got a month,
02:52 perhaps it might be a bit limited.
02:54 I think six weeks is a nice break for them, the children, because, you know, they study
02:59 and they're at school a lot and I think they need to have a bit of a break in the summer.
03:02 I don't think they need to go another two weeks.