Holiday calendar for schools

Build the list around the academic session

CBSE and ICSE schools run the session from April to March, while many state board schools in the south start in June. Draft the holiday list in February or March with the principal, the management and the transport head in the room. Start with the national holidays, add your state's gazetted holidays and the local festivals your families celebrate, such as Ganesh Chaturthi in Pune, Onam in Kochi or Chhath in Patna, then block the vacations. Circulate one version to parents and a staff version that also shows which groups work on which days.

Vacations for teachers, working days for the office

A typical north Indian school closes for students from mid-May to the end of June, for about a week around Dussehra or Diwali, and for ten days or so from late December. Teachers are on vacation for most of that time, apart from a few duty days. The office, accounts, admission counter and maintenance team keep working, and the transport team often takes its leave in these weeks. Set each vacation as holidays that apply only to teaching departments. If the whole school, office included, shuts for Diwali week, make that week a company holiday for everyone.

• Summer vacation: teaching departments only
• Diwali break: whole school, if the office also closes
• Winter break: teaching departments, with a skeleton office
• Duty days in vacation: punched, then credited as comp-off

Optional holidays and sudden closures

A school with staff from many communities can keep a short optional list, such as Eid ul-Adha, Good Friday, Guru Nanak Jayanti, Karva Chauth and Chhath, and let each person pick two in the year. Check the picks before term, so that a section does not lose three teachers on the same day. Sudden closures are different. When the district administration shuts schools for a cold wave or heavy rain, add the day as a holiday for the affected branch as soon as the order arrives, so attendance does not mark staff absent. If teachers are still expected for planning or evaluation, close it for students only.

Separate lists for each branch

A school group with branches in Ahmedabad and Mumbai cannot share one list. Uttarayan matters in Gujarat, Gudi Padwa in Maharashtra, and each state notifies its own holidays. Keep the national and management holidays common to the group, then add each branch's state and local holidays only to that branch. The trust office sees every branch's calendar in one place, and a teacher transferred to another branch mid-year sees that branch's list in self-service.

How to set it up in ZeniaHR

1. In Holiday Calendars, add the national, state and management holidays for the year, choosing the category for each: public, optional, national, religious, regional or company.
2. Add summer, autumn and winter vacation days as company holidays that apply only to teaching departments, so office and support staff stay on working days.
3. Use Data Import to load a long holiday list from Excel when you set up a new year for several branches at once.
4. Apply state and local festival holidays only to the branch concerned, keeping group-wide holidays common to all branches.
5. Mark optional holidays with a yearly pick limit, then read the report of who picked which optional holiday before each term starts.
6. Set Independence Day, Republic Day and Gandhi Jayanti as recurring yearly holidays, and add sudden closure days for the affected branch the day the order comes.

Read more about holiday calendars in ZeniaHR.

Roles this applies to

Frequently asked questions