Academic term
In most countries, the academic year begins in late summer or early autumn and ends during the following spring or summer. In Northern Hemisphere countries, this means that the academic year lasts from August, September, or October to May, June, or July. In Southern Hemisphere countries, the academic year aligns with the calendar year, lasting from February or March to November or December. The summer may or may not be part of the term system.
School holiday
Typically, each term lasts for approximately ten weeks (give or take a week), with school holidays after each term (typically two weeks although this varies between jurisdictions). Historically, the Term 1 holidays have been scheduled around Easter, reflecting the three-term system's notion of an extended Easter break within Term 1; although since the mid-1990s this has gradually changed, and now only Queensland and Victoria tie the school holidays closely to Easter; the remainder of Australia and all of New Zealand now have a fixed length to Term 1 which leads to a school holiday in April and the Easter period falling within Term 1 in some years with an early Easter, such as 2018. The Term 2 holidays generally take place in early July, possibly beginning in the last days of June; and the Term 3 holidays usually encompass the last days of September and the first days of October (although in the year 2000, due to the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, the state of New South Wales extended the break after Term 3 to three weeks and held it earlier in September, with students returning to school at the start of October).