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During his visit to Marseille, the President of the Republic questioned the duration of the summer holidays, pointing to their recent extension. Comments contradicted by the evolution of school calendars.
Question asked by Michel G. on June 27 on Twitter
Hello, you asked us about a statement by Emmanuel Macron on summer vacation on June 27, during his three-day visit to Marseille. In front of the press, he mentioned “children who sometimes have two and a half months of vacation” or, for some, “almost three months” in the summer, also claimed that the holidays “rather lengthened during the last twenty years”.
A longer vacation, really? To get to the bottom of it, CheckNews consulted the archives of the school calendar, available on the National Education website. The calculation, carried out with the dates of zone A, was carried out over the period 2001-2023, which covers the words of the President of the Republic; the total includes holidays and weekends included in the holiday periods.
Shortened summer vacation, including middle and high school
The results contradict Emmanuel Macron. In fact, the summer holidays have been shortened by about a week since the beginning of the century, in order to lengthen the All Saints holidays, which went from one week to a week and a half in 2003-2004, then to two weeks in 2012-2013, but also to officially create the Ascension Thursday weekend, in 2018-2019. Result, children, who pa