Overview

• Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg maintain their fixed late-August to mid-September holiday window, rejecting proposals to join the rotating dates followed by other states.
• The Bundeselternrat and the Bavarian Elternverband have shifted focus from holiday timing to the burden of six-week breaks, warning that average annual vacation allowances leave families grappling with prolonged childcare gaps.
• A Civey-SoVD survey found that over 70% of parents rate holiday childcare offerings as too limited and nearly half must use more than half of their own leave to care for children during the six-week break.
• The Bundesschülerkonferenz and several unions reject shortening holidays and instead call for partnerships with youth centers and sports clubs to provide high-quality, pedagogical holiday programs.
• Christoph Ploß has proposed extending and staggering the holiday period to smooth tourism flows; the GEW cautions that an early June start could lead to heat-related school closures.