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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To be really disappointed on behalf of my daughter

216 replies

vinnipokh · 26/02/2019 03:59

First post and a bit long but feeling really hacked off with parents at school. My dd is in yr5. At the start of yr 6 they take them on a residential trip for 5 days. The cost if this is about £450. A lot of money for some, but most people in the school are in work and you know it's coming so you can save up. We had to let the school know last year for rough numbers and so they could see if the trip was viable. After they got rough numbers we had the itinerary and deposit was to be paid by end Jan.

They had 9 kids paying deposits. The school was v. calm and extended the deadline, a few more signed up. Still not enough to make the trip viable. School renegotiated the trip and cut a day, to make it cheaper with new deadline of end of half term.

We had an email last night, saying they still haven't got enough kids so the trip won't go ahead. My dd will be so disappointed. She was really looking forward to travelling with classmates and staying in a hotel with them. My ds did this 2yrs ago and had a brilliant time.

A quick chat with some of the parents revealed that there seems to be various weak reasons for not going like, "so and so isn't going so my lo won't go" or "I am worried about the food" or "terrorism". I am so p***d off about the apathy on the parents part that all the kids are now not having a residential trip. AIBU?

OP posts:
AlexaShutUp · 26/02/2019 08:08

It's very disappointing for your dd, of course, but you can't blame the other parents for not wanting to send their children. That's their choice.

Life is full of shit like this, and part of our role as parents is to help our kids deal with the inevitable disappointments that will crop up. As it happens, I missed out on my year 6 residential many moons ago, due to staffing issues at my school. My older sibling had been on the trip, which had happened every other year, and I felt really cheated that my year missed out. My dd has missed out on a similar trip to France in year 7, again because of staffing issues at her school.

YANBU to be disappointed on behalf of your dd, but these things happen and it's your job to help her deal with it - and remember that you can find valuable learning from that as well. It really isn't the fault of other parents if they can't afford it/don't want their kids to go, so let go of that, and focus on what you can do for your dd instead to make up for what she's going to miss out on.

greendale17 · 26/02/2019 08:09

**That is a lot of money.

And that's quite a selfish approach from you. It's really none of your business why people don't want their children to go - regardless of what reasons they give.

And also, who are you to declare these reasons to be weak? They might be very real to the parents of those children.**

^This

Duchessgummybuns · 26/02/2019 08:10

Wow. I’m not going to complain about my daughter’s residential costing £87 anymore.

I’d expect to get a small family holiday for £450 so I’m curious to know how the school justifies this amount for each child.

Meandmetoo · 26/02/2019 08:11

Whoa that's expensive, my DC wouldn't be going on that trip either!

TheClaws · 26/02/2019 08:16

I love that you “had a chat” with them. You actually approached them and asked why they’d backed out? Shock Did you add how disappointed your DD is?

Biancadelrioisback · 26/02/2019 08:18

Literally more expensive than our family holiday this year. I could not afford that. I would probably say yes though at the time and hope I could scrape the money together or find the money somehow. I wouldn't like to opt out incase circumstances changed.
It's a shame its cancelled and those that could afford it are now unable to go but that's life.

ineedaholidaynow · 26/02/2019 08:23

I think OP’s main gripe is that the majority of parents said they were interested in the trip, so the school said it would go ahead, then most of these parents pulled out so the trip can’t go ahead. Yes, some of the parents’ circumstances might have changed but surely not all of them.

If these parents had said it was too expensive in the first place the school may have come up with a cheaper alternative, but I assume there may not be time fo them to do that now.

OP maybe you could get together with some of the other parents and do some research of cheaper alternatives, possibly more local to the school, to cut down on travel costs (which can be one of the higher costs) and present these ideas to the school. I know one year at DS’s Primary School, the teacher organising that year’s class trip asked the parents if they knew of any cheap but suitable accommodation, so she could make the trip a mini residential, instead of a 14 hour day trip.

Ihatemyseleffordoingthis · 26/02/2019 08:25

£450 is ludicrous, and you know it
And it's not "apathy" to not be able to afford it, for a nervous child to not want to go without their friends, or to have anxieties about young kids welfare.
The school needs to learn and scale and cost future trips appropriately. I'm sure they will do something else to celebrate getting through the bastards SATS

Ihatemyseleffordoingthis · 26/02/2019 08:25

oops bastard SATs (not plural)

Birdsgottafly · 26/02/2019 08:27

For some it would have been cost. For others they may well have worried about the food.

Some Parents won't let their children go away with anyone outside the Family while they are in Primary School. But don't want to say.

The child might have not wanted to go and they were hoping that they would get them to change their mind, or expand their eating.

My DD went to Paris and Rouen, I was glad, because France doesn't appeal to me. With the cost of new clothes, pj's etc. It meant a big cut down on everything for six months. If I had have had something else big happen, if would have been a case of her not being able to go.

PreseaCombatir · 26/02/2019 08:28

We’re the prices disclosed in advance?
(Sorry if I’ve missed it)
That might be why, oh a residential, yeah x would love that!
Oh it’s £450, hmm, isn’t that the week great auntie Ethel is visiting so you can’t possible go. Etc

As a side note I think £450 is really expensive. Our year five are going for a three day, two night which is £185.

HeyArthur · 26/02/2019 08:28

That is a lot of money especially when you have more than one child in the family going on school trips.
My dd is at college and a trip has come up that will cost £4000! I can't afford that but thankfully she doesn't want to go. My ds goes on a lot of drama & music trips & it gets bloody expensive.

MamaDane · 26/02/2019 08:31

That is a lot of money and we wouldn't be able to afford it when our twins are born. I think you're being unreasonable but I also understand that you're upset your daughter is disappointed. It's a good time to explain how not everyone has the same means and that your family is at least fortunate enough to afford something like this while others struggle more.

x2boys · 26/02/2019 08:31

Well obviously it's a lot of money, as for people asking what parents put their child s name down when they can't afford ,well it's one of those things that might seem affordable when it's first discussed , it than life gets in the way clearly if posters can't understand this than they have never had to worry about money Hmm

Butchyrestingface · 26/02/2019 08:33

Some people want to control their kids, other folks want to control their kids’ friends’ parents.

It takes all kinds. Smile

ToffeePennie · 26/02/2019 08:40

That is actually £50 over the cost of our 14 night summer holiday this year. Myself and my husband couldn’t afford it as well as a summer holiday so we would have to sacrifice spending time as a family and with great grandparents to alllow our son to go

budgiegirl · 26/02/2019 08:43

I’m a bit in the fence here. YABU if the reason lots of children have backed out is due to cost. £450 is a lot, and may well be beyond many people’s means.

However, as a cub leader, I have noticed an increasing ‘apathy’ from parents to send their children on camp, and camp is very cheap, with financial help offered. We used to get almost all the pack going, up to 30 children. Now we struggle to get a dozen. Parents are definitely more reluctant these days to let their children go off and have adventures. They worry about the food, the cold, the homesickness, the activities, the accommodation, even the fact their child might not brush their teeth. They make their child anxious, and it becomes a vicious circle.

So if children aren’t going due to cost (which at that cost, might well be the case even if they don’t say so), YABU. However, if it’s for the reasons they give, YANBU.

bigcomfypants · 26/02/2019 08:44

That’s an obscene cost. The average household income in the uk is £525 a week! I consider us to be comfortable but there is no way I could pay that for a child’s activity holiday for a week.

Ds and dds was £145 for 4 nights and the PTA had a fund to pay for anyone who couldn’t afford it so they all went.

Springwalk · 26/02/2019 08:52

Your sense of entitlement is breathtaking op, you have literally zero empathy or understanding of other school families.
Your dd is learning by your example that is the worst of it.

notacooldad · 26/02/2019 08:52

That's an expensive trip!
We could afford it but I wouldnt have paid that for my child to attend. I would have said no to it.

I wouldn't be making excuses either.In your shoes I'd just be saying to DD that you
dont think it is good value for money.

amusedbush · 26/02/2019 08:55

DH and I just booked an eight night multi-city break in Europe for £450pp - that's an extortionate amount for a school trip! Confused

I think these types of trips are great and I certainly enjoyed going away with my school but asking the average family to pull £450 out of their arse for a school trip is ridiculous.

WhentheRabbitsWentWild · 26/02/2019 09:00

Granted it was 5 years ago now , but when my youngest DC went to Wales , with school, for a week, it was £250 . Could pay in instalments which I did at £50 pm for 5 months ,
When DC3 (youngest brother) went I was in financial woes and they kindly paid half so he could go . They felt it important he went, so he went,
Its a lot of money but perhaps that is the norm 5 years on . No idea .
As PPs have said, I think YABU due to the fact nobody would tell you outright they cannot afford it .

SassitudeandSparkle · 26/02/2019 09:02

I was griping on her about DD's residential costing about a hundred pounds less than that last year, I thought that was expensive!

Is it a one-form entry school? That does seem a very low take-up for a residential but I do think the high cost has something to do with it.

ineedaholidaynow · 26/02/2019 09:03

I do think it is a lot of money, and possibly the school have failed to take into account the parents’ demographic.

DS’s old school used to do a foreign trip for the Y6 residential but it got too expensive, so went for UK PGL type trip when it was DS’s turn and subsequent years.

RiverTam · 26/02/2019 09:05

In our school the pta and school council do fundraising throughout the year for the year 6 trip so the cost is nowhere like that much.