DD school trip in 2 hours. Woke up to a lot of ranty msgs from another parent

[BackwardsGoing]

Who has just twigged that the kids are not allowed phones for their 2 nights 3 days away.

School has communicated this in emails, letters and F2F meetings for most of the year.

Ranty parent (RP) wants all parents to stand in solidarity against the no phone rule. This morning. While the kids are getting on the coach!

AIBU to say this is (a) bonkers (b) far too late and (c) bonkers.

BTW children are year 6 / 10-11 yo and the school has promised regular updates via Facebook.

@Paddington68 I had a very similar chat with DM the other day.

Me: They had a spare space at forest school today, so I sent DS.
DM: Lovely, where they go?
Me: Dunno, the forest?

Still not sure where they went, all I know is DS liked the moterway!

DGS is in yr 6 and almost surgically attached to his phone. When they went for their week in West Wales a few weeks ago mobile phones were, of course, banned. Every parent thought this a good thing and all the kids survived.

is yr kid able to keep a cheap phone hidden, switched off in a bag? Tell him/her to hide it from every single other person so it won't get confiscated and just to text you from the toilet. Turn sound and vibrate off, no one will know, tell everyone he/she hasn't got one.

Oh fgs MB, are you 5?

@MB246 - how ridiculous. That's a sure way to be barred from further trips at DS's school.

If I want contact with my kid, I shall do as required

The chance of them banning a kid for taking a phone is well within the risk.

They won't find it

biscuit
the phones also intensified the homesickness massively for some.

I have seen this happen too.

No

That's fine, but then don't send them on a trip if you can't abide by the rules set. What message are you giving them?

If you disagree with a rule, discuss it with the school.

If they still keep the rule, and you think it is wrong for your child, don't send your child on the trip.

Teaching your child to lie is not going to good for them in the long run. Sooner or later they are going to try that attitude with something with serious consequences.

is yr kid able to keep a cheap phone hidden, switched off in a bag? Tell him/her to hide it from every single other person so it won't get confiscated and just to text you from the toilet. Turn sound and vibrate off, no one will know, tell everyone he/she hasn't got one

What an utterly stupid suggestion.

If I want contact with my kid, I shall do as required

Fair enough.

So don't send them on trips where you aren't prepared to go by the rules set. Just keep your child at home under your own rules where you can contact them whenever you like.

Someone needs to run resilience training for parents who are unable to cope without being in constant contact with their children. If you don't trust the trip organisers to look after your child, don't send them.

Biscuits
interesting to hear from a teachers POV.
incidentally I just went on a weekend away with friends to somewhere pretty remote (countryside) and had no signal or wifi. While it was nice to re-set and have a phone detox for a weekend, I did actually want to message DH to confirm I had arrived safely (3hr+ drive on friday night after work). I think in yesteryear there would prob have been a payphone at the accomodation that I would have used.
My DD is year 8 and whilst never more than a few cm from her phone, is pretty rubbish about actually using it to communicate with me