Not picked to help on school trip - again. Do I ask why?

[sayhellotothelittlefella]

This might be longer than the actual subject warrants but I want to put as much as I can in the OP so there’s no drip feeding and to explain my strong feelings.
So yet again I’ve offered to help on DS’ school trip and yet again I haven’t been chosen. Last time I wasn’t picked I did phone up and ask if my DBS was still current as I hadn’t been picked to help for several years. I suppose it was a bit obvious this was a roundabout way of asking why I wasn’t able to help - only to be told they didn’t have the reply slip with my offer of help but I would be 1st on the reserve list and next time make sure the letter was back on time and there wouldn’t be a problem. Not so. Last thing on Friday the volunteers list came out ( anything vaguely contentious always gets sent out at 3:15 on Friday) and it’s the SAME few names as it is every trip and has been for years ( even the mums themselves say they always get to go). Normally wouldn’t bother me but with my older DC we made a lot of effort to help with one trip for each of them - DH would take a day off work to watch the younger DC so I could go.
There is a bit of back story with the school but it would derail this thread to go into it - suffice it to say they have no grounds to not pick me. There were no issues when I helped previously, it’s different teaching staff anyway, I give a lot of time to the PTA and the other schools my DC attend have a VERY favourable attitude towards our family. This school is renowned for having favourites. It’s the same with the pupils - always the same few families who’s DC get to do everything. I don’t know how to pitch this really and am genuinely looking for advice and a different perspective. So AIBU to go in tomorrow and ask why I’m still not picked, why is it the same people ( others do also offer) and that after such a long time it’s getting harder to pretend it’s not personal?

I might... checking the newsletters, there is nothing there about sports day yet

Blimey, at our school they are always sending desperate calls for trip volunteers because they don't have enough!

The governors won’t give a tinker’s cuss - not their remit. It’s operational.

Can you imagine running to the school goveners with this...!

“It’s so unfair! Pick me, pick me! I’m great with kids! Pleeeeease pick me!!!!!!!! Pick me!!!!!!! Whhhhhy does no one like me..?!”

I can hear the eye rolling already.....!

One of our classes which seems to have a bigger percentage of "very involved" parents have had to put apology/explanation notices up in the window over who got to go on the school trip thing!

As for sports day - think last year ours got rescheduled twice and was on the very last date before it was just going to be cancelled for the year cos of the weather/vandalism on the local park they used for it. Wish that school would cancel it as it's the fucking head from hell on a PA system turned up so loud I could tell you who won the Y6 race and I live 5 streets away! Known our current school's provisional sports day date since the start of the academic year though - but obviously that one's more weather-permitting than lots of functions and with the parents of one not very sportingly-gifted child and one outright dyspraxic I do not have warm glowing feelings over sports day as a general rule We get a very good outline of the year at the start in September which then gets tweaked and padded out but well communicated to parents and they try to do things like put parents evenings on the same date as play performances so people only need to try to get out of work for one afternoon rather than two.

Sometimes I think it's just that you get known as a helpful face (PTA often doesn't help that if there's not staff at the meetings for that) and then tend to get asked more and slowly suckered in in my case the school know I'm trying to get into a position where I can look at returning to teaching (yes everyone's running to get OUT of it - I'm the sucker trying to get back IN) so I'm available a lot of the time, desperately seeking references - and I genuinely do get a lot of enjoyment out of working with the kids.

Many of the parents who are the first to try and volunteer for trips are usually the parents of the children who need the experience of a trip away from those parents in order to help to build resilience and independence.

I can’t understand why so many of the replies are so snarky, unpleasant and so desperate to paint the OP as some sort of stroppy toddler.

I can see it is annoying for the places to always go to the same parents. Although I suspect it’s just the teachers not thinking and preferring the known mums rather than deliberately excluding you. I would have a friendly word and just explain that you would like to be asked to go on the next trip if it’s possible. I think that’s perfectly reasonable. 🙂

I was always picked to go on trips. I think it was because I knew the teachers and was available. All four my kids were at the same small junior school at the same time so I ended up knowing everyone well. I think it was just that I was there rather than because I was the teachers pet. I was in a country where the parents often drove groups of kids in their own cars which put a whole different spin on things as I wasn’t keen on having random parents driving my kids about - especially as driving standards in the country we were in were poor. It ended up that I went on most trips. I found a lot of them excrucuatly boring 😭😭😭

Organising trips is a minefield. It's too risky to take new volunteer helpers every time. With the playscheme we try to include parents where possible, but the trip is about the kids so we do take the volunteers we know well most of the time because I know how they'll be.

Also, it's not always about the parent. I have some parents who we never allow volunteer because of the reaction of their child. We don't allow parents to have their child in their group, and I'm not going to have a child upset all day because someone else is hanging out with their Mum/Dad/Granny and they aren't. Nor am I going to change the rules for them.

Parent helpers are a minefield.

Wildlingofthewest. KittyHawk

Try RTFT. The OP has already said she wouldn’t go to the governors. There is no need for you to get so worked up about imaginary scenerios. 😂

Ex-primary teacher here.

I tended to find that in Key Stage 1 there would be loads of parents desperate to go and by the time DC get to Y5/Y6 the novelty has worn off/more parents are working full time and you have to really twist arms to get enough volunteers.

It's true there are some parents who always volunteer (tends to be the PTA parents) and I always tried to vary things a bit to make it fair, so a mixture of taking some parents who I knew from experience would be brilliant and reliable and making sure a few "new" parents got to go for a change. It was great if dads volunteered so unlikely to say no to them (lots of kids having no male role models at home).

There were certain parents who I wouldn't take because they'd been such a liability on previous trips (e.g. ignoring their alloted group of children while trying to take photos of/showing things to their own child, abandoning their group completely in a museum gallery and popping off to get a coffee from the café/have a smoke, putting down the bag with their group's activity sheets/pencils in and losing it...I've seen them all!!) There were a few of these parents who were blacklisted and politely refused for future trips. I used to tell the parents that I'd picked names "out of the hat", but that was a total lie, I just chose who I thought would be the best mix of reliable regulars and newbies!

I have read the full thread, but thanks for the head up.

I just find it astonishing that this is actually being seen as a genuine problem. And I’m afraid that the OP is coming across as a needy toddler. She had put herself forward several times to be a helper. She hasn’t been asked to help. Most stable, sensible adults wouldn’t be creating a ridiculous drama about it! Most have far more important/serious things to be dealing with

Maybe being a massive drama queen is why she’s being overlooked...?!

Wildlingofthewest You don’t give the impression of having read the thread. How is the OP asking if it’s ok to go into the school and ask about it a ‘ridiculous drama’ . She would like to go but hasn’t done anything that would mark her a ‘massive drama queen’ . I think this is more likely to be to do with the teachers choosing parents they know rather than anything the OP has done.

Thank you, SoFake. What an apposite moniker. Er - I did read it all. I wasn’t necessarily addressing the OP - you’ll find there are other contributors on this thread. Kind of how it works. I also wasn’t the least bit worked up. I was simply remarking - to the person who suggested it; to anyone else who might think it’s a good idea - that it’s not something to go to the governors with. I’m glad it reduced you to tears of mirth, though. You must have an almost singularly low humour threshold; I’m surprised you’re able to get anything else done.

YABU. I helped on a school trip once - was guilted into offering. It was awful, it chucked it down with rain and my own child clung to me like a limpet and refused to join in with anything. It cemented the realisation that I really don’t enjoy other people’s children in large numbers! I would be delighted to be ‘blacklisted’!

@sofake

What are you going on about?!

Gawd....

This is beyond ridiculous.

I hope she does go to speak to the governors. The next instalment of this saga will keep my entertained on my journey home...

Some people just love creating drama....

The OP isn’t creating a drama. I know it would make for a more entertaining thread but her plan to go and ask about it seems reasonable to me.

abandoning their group completely in a museum gallery and popping off to get a coffee from the café/have a smoke
Please tell me that these were at least older primary children, not juniors. Was the parent reprimanded and/or try to justify their inexcusable actions?

This reminds me of one situation I encountered.

Three other parents and I were asked at the very last minute to accompany a group of around 30 primary students to an event that had just come up that day. Without parent helpers it couldn't go ahead. Starting the next day, it involved three 14 hour days, culminating in a TV appearance.

On the last day, a mother that I knew vaguely also came along to "chaperone" - along with her three year old daughter! She just turned up at the event. I think she wanted "in" on what she perceived was a "glamorous" trip. (It wasn't. It was exhausting albeit fun). At one point, she pissed off for some reason (can't remember why now), leaving the three year old with us for about half an hour. To be fair, she wasn't any trouble, but that's not the point. You better believe we brought this up with the principal. Hopefully she was banned from any more trips.

How do you think that conversation is going to go??

It’s blindingly obvious that she is being overlooked for a reason. Her face doesn’t fit, she not part of the clique, someone has taken a dislike to her - who knows. She’s never going to get an honest answer in any case so going in and asking just makes her look really desperate. Desperately seeking approval, desperate to be part of the in crowd.

Sometimes in life you just have to pull your big girl pants up and accept that you don’t always get what you want. And that’s ok.

I could understand it if it was a genuinely serious issue but come on, we are taking about a insignificant school outing. No one wants to go to the Sealife centre that badly, do they...?!

In this nicest way- step back. You don't need to assuage your guilt by doing this. Your son is in an alright school with good friends. You would've moved him if you could, but that's not currently possible. You've offered to help, but you're not currently needed- you can't and don't need to do more. I'm betting the choice of parent is probably 90% not about you and if on the small chance they've not chosen you because you couldn't make it last time, then, stuff them. Some parents also need to go on trips due to the needs of their kids. In our school- the choice is whatever's easiest for the school. Your son knows in a million other ways you are a devoted mum.

@CatkinToadflax - sounds spookily like the same school.

Wildingofthewest - what drama? Did I miss something? I haven’t even spoken to anyone.
SoFake and other pp who seem to have grasped what I’m saying. Thank you for the type of advice I was after. Having considered it all I’m not sure asking really is the best idea - If it was personal then I won’t get the truth and if it isn’t then I have nothing to worry about. However I can see that although I am very positive in my interaction with the staff at school the very fact my elder DD moved schools and my younger DS was sent to the neighbouring one may be instrumental in their reasoning not to use me. Unjustly though, as this doesn’t affect my ability to be useful in supervising a group of children which I’m very good at and have done successfully at the other school and the DC’s sports clubs on occasions. It does seem to be just this school.
Also to the pp who called me over involved - you couldn’t be more wrong, if you rtft I have helped only once each with the older DC and the number of DC I’ve mentioned illustrates I have more than double the normal number - I don’t have the luxury of being over involved. Sometimes I struggle to remember their names ( that was a joke obviously before anyone says I wouldn’t be any good if I couldn’t remember names)

Your original post makes it sound like your over thinking it and causing drama in your own head

Most people wouldn’t have given this banal mundane “problem” a second thought. The fact that you posted on this forum about it proves that your heavily invested in it, that it’s bothering you, that you are thinking about it etc when in most people’s reality there are way more serious things that take up their headspace.
You seem very keen to be seen to be helping. To be acknowledged as being really great at looking after kids. To be one of the chosen ones who is called upon to supervise the kiddies. I question why this is so important to you?

On the last day, a mother that I knew vaguely also came along to "chaperone" - along with her three year old daughter! She just turned up at the event. I think she wanted "in" on what she perceived was a "glamorous" trip. (It wasn't. It was exhausting albeit fun). At one point, she pissed off for some reason (can't remember why now), leaving the three year old with us for about half an hour. To be fair, she wasn't any trouble, but that's not the point. You better believe we brought this up with the principal. Hopefully she was banned from any more trips.

The joy of a parent inadvertantly shattering your ratio.

I had one turn up with 3yo twins. Not only could she not count, but one of my other adults had to be with them as our ratio is 1:1 for under 5s.

The other classic we had was a parent taking her child, and only her child, to the gift shop. And the one who clipped their child around the ear for being cheeky - which lead to a "I was at X museum and saw one of your leaders strike a child" nightmare.

wildlingofthewest No, not sure where you’re getting all that from either??
The reason for my OP was to get advice on whether I was over thinking it and should I ask why I wasn’t picked - but thanks for spotting that and pointing it out to me
How does wanting to help on one trip amount to everything you’ve accused me of - thats quite an extrapolation

I do have far more serious things going on in my head and I have in fact posted on another board for advice on one of those issues. And the other stuff I have no need of AIBU. Should I pose all my life dilemmas here so you can be the judge of what warrants room in my headspace?
If something like this would never bother you then bully for you.

I get picked because I’m school governor & know the staff & my working hours are flexible.
You seem very hung up on ‘not being picked’ and sound like you might be hard work...TBH this is probably the reason you’re not picked.