To wonder who funds a teacher's school trip

[iwasjustwonderingreally]

My daughter went skiing with her school in February half term.

Four teachers accompanied them.

Do teachers pay for themselves, or a contribution, (I appreciate they are working though), or is the cost to the pupil inflated to cover the cost of the teachers?

The teachers were all most definitely drunk when we went to France but this was over 20 years ago, I'm surprised at teachers doing this nowadays!

I had to pay £50 to go on a primary school residential to London, to help keep the cost down for pupils! An amazing time was had but I didn’t get paid any extra for being on duty for 3 days! All the teachers and TAs did this!

there's a big gap between unfit to drive, and drunk
I won't drive after a single drink.
I am perfectly competent to look after my children and deal with emergencies after three drinks.

I would expect school trips to have a nightly designated driver (on DC2's residential a kid needed driving to A&E), and a spare to step up if that person got called out, but I wouldn't be fussed about the rest of them having a couple of beers.

I cannot think of anything I'd rather do less than take a school trip away overnight - away from my own family, extra hours for no money, no guaranteed time off/breaks, constant nagging feeling that if something goes wrong I'd cop for it. I am very grateful to staff that run these things. The idea that staff should pay is ridiculous.

I love how it's gone from "tipsy" to "drunk" to "pissed" in a few stages

@Lavenderlid

I love how it's gone from "tipsy" to "drunk" to "pissed" in a few stages

And yet, apparently the same kind of inflation could never happen to teenagers recounting events.

I'm a secondary school teacher and I can tell you right now that no teacher in their right mind would pay to go on a school trip. You're delusional if you think a few hours of skiing makes up for the sleep deprivation that comes with teenage coach trips, or the unpleasantness of policing teenagers who want nothing more than to sneak out of their rooms at night to drink/meet up with boyfriends/girlfriends etc. Or the sheer rage that comes with CONSTANTLY having to police them keeping seatbelts on in buses/taxis etc. or dealing with the inevitable student who has motion sickness (and cleaning up his/her vomit), or having to try (usually in vain) to prevent them from leaving the coach a sticky disaster of squashed sweets. Or the weight of responsibility that comes with trying to ensure their safety/ensure nobody gets lost (or "lost" - teenagers inevitably want to disappear). And, remember, this is half term! This should be a holiday for the teacher as well, who, by the way, still needs to mark a pile of work that was handed in before the holidays and plan lessons for the week after the holidays, i.e. making powerpoints, researching, reading ahead, making up worksheets etc.

@iwasjustwonderingreally

Jeez, it was just a simple question to clarify a situation as a parent is complaining that the teachers were drunk when their child was ill.

I'm not saying teachers should pay!!!!

Was it your child? Are you on the board of management?

How are you involved?

Would you fork out to look after & keep safe numerous over-excited children, 24-7?

[quote ReadyToMoveIt]@rosesarebluey you’re offended by ‘FFS’?![/quote]
Just about to say the exact same thing!

The companies offering ski trips and long haul trips to schools operate on at least a 50% net profit margin, often more. So if you pay £2,000 for your child's trip, £1,000 (or more) of that is profit for the company. Out of the other £1,000 (or less) come all the expenses for the trip, including free places for accompanying staff. For these more expensive trips the companies do a lot of the organisation for the trip.
If pupils are encouraged to fundraise for their trip, at least half of what they raise goes to the company running the trip.
In the schools I worked in, there was always the same group of teachers who went on the attractive non-curricular trips (skiing, Africa, China) - usually this group consisted of the organisers of other attractive trips, on a quid pro quo basis. I went on a week's residential in Brittany and a couple of day trips to Cleethorpes!

Obviously the cost of the children’s ski trip is increased to cover the teachers. As if any teacher would pay for themselves to go. Honestly, sometimes mumsnet is ridiculous.

@Responsiveroo

Fgs they don’t “deserve” to have a few drinks at the end of the day that renders them not able to drive for example

There should have been a rota ie two can drink but the other refrain completely

There were ALL drinking

What vehicle are they supposed be able to drive..?

The coach?
Or should they just hotwire a random car in the ski resort?

I feel sorry for the teachers, I doubt all of them were drunk. What a shame, I’m sure there will be zero school trips like this going forward as none will be willing to go, I imagine it would be difficult to remain in full work mode 24 hours a day.
When I was at school we went to the theatre (sixth form) my teacher only had debit card, no cash and he asked to borrow £10 for some refreshments until Monday, I had no issue with this, however the accompanying English teacher reported him and I was called in to the head, he had to apologise to me! I said it was unnecessary and he knew it was nothing I had said, I saw him a few years ago and we laughed about it, teacher who reported it left not long after. This reminds me of that

Obviously the cost of the children’s ski trip is increased to cover the teachers. As if any teacher would pay for themselves to go. Honestly, sometimes mumsnet is ridiculous.

This reminds me of the occasional posts on here where people complain that they've asked the nanny to take their children to the zoo and now she wants them to pay for her ticket

@IceVolcanoes

Some kid took a photo of the teacher holding a beer presumably. Then spread it around on social media claiming the teachers were all wasted. That’s my guess at what’s really happened.

Meanwhile, little Johnny didn’t get personalised nursing care like he would from mummy, when he had a bit of a headache.

So the teachers should all be hung. Clearly.

And the HT is trying to cover it up too. 🙄

This is exactly what I suspect is the way this panned out in reality. It never ceases to amaze me how gullible some parents are when it comes to being totally lied to by their own children. Teachers see the real side to people's kids, but some parents are just blind.

I don’t think anyone who has never taken other peoples children away on overnight or longer trips can understand how stressful they are. Lots of kids, you think you know but never know how they will respond to being away from home, you are on duty 24 hours a day, you sleep with your ears open ( it is like having large new borns, ) . You are constantly counting, checking, being vigilant, while simultaneously comforting anxious children , encouraging nervous ones, calming the boisterous, you check on what they are eating, how they are dressed, how much they are sleeping, you try to keep track of the belongings they discard, lose and damage! You stay positive when it rains, slap on sunscreen when it is hot, make sure they have pictures of their achievements and you glow as you watch them blossom and show sides of their personalities you never knew about.

The very thought that some people seem to resent the fact that teachers aren’t paying for the privilege of caring for other peoples children for free during their own free time is astonishing, but not totally unexpected, on all the school journeys I arranged, supervised and accompanied I can count on the fingers of one hand the parents who said “Thankyou for taking them, I appreciate how hard it must be.”

I have never taken kids abroad, or done an activity as potentially dangerous as skiing, so hats off to those teachers brave enough and resilient enough to do so.

@iwasjustwonderingreally

Jeez, it was just a simple question to clarify a situation as a parent is complaining that the teachers were drunk when their child was ill.

I'm not saying teachers should pay!!!!

I remember going on school trips at comp, there were always wild rumours about the teachers, which were all completely made up! We thought it was hilarious, looking back now I realise based on your posts that we could have got one in serious trouble.

If I'm honest, I'd steer clear of this whole thing and let the parent complain, your child was looked after and cared for correctly so you personally have no reason to complain, and the parent in question will most likely end up with egg on their face once this is investigated.

Teacher places are free. The cost is soaked up by the rest.

@iwasjustwonderingreally

The complaint is that their child was ill and they'd have expected there to be at least one teacher who wasn't drunk and who could take responsibility.

I would imagine we'd all hope that when sending our kids away with the school.

There is video/photographic evidence of drunken teachers. The Head Mistress has actually contacted some pupils asking them to delete the photos.

I wouldn't begrudge the teachers having a drink ...but like you you would expect one each night to stay sober for safety ....it reminds me of a school trip we went on to Germany ...we went to a beer hall to see the atmosphere (we obviously all had soft drinks etc as think we were in year 9) ...all the teachers bar one had one of the stines of beer and while they weren't drunk / still capable one of the teachers didn't drink ( I remember because we asked her why and she said because she had to keep an eye on us!)

I dont understand why you are signing a mass letter Bout a particular student instead of writing your own about your own concerns.

You can then ask who funds it from the school who will know. I'm not sure how it's relevant, presumably it wouldn't matter of there hadn't been unacceptable behaviour by the teachers and their duty of care.

It sounds like someone wants to write "all while WE we paying for the teachers!"

Its irrelevant who paid. The duty of care is the issue, stick with it.

Our school holds fundraisers to send teachers on holiday... not even school trips just mid-term holidays (to exotic locations).

They say the teachers 'learn' things on these 'excursions' and then share that wisdom with the class... I frankly find it cheeky fuckery.

Potential teacher misconduct is an entirely separate issue to who pays for the teachers on a school trip.

I would NEVER want to take a bunch of someone else's kids away on a residential trip and be responsible for them. There actually isn't enough you could pay me to do that as I have some...err...interesting memories of what people used to get up to on the school trips I went on as a teenager. Happily, I work in adult education so that won't be asked of me.

The idea that teachers should pay for the privilege of taking other people's kids away is really very funny . They don't earn megabucks, you know. What would you choose if you couldn't afford both...a holiday with your own family or a school trip shepherding other people's kids?

@mam0918

Our school holds fundraisers to send teachers on holiday... not even school trips just mid-term holidays (to exotic locations).

They say the teachers 'learn' things on these 'excursions' and then share that wisdom with the class... I frankly find it cheeky fuckery.

Well I've never heard of that in my life and I've been teaching for 38 years.

Have also been on a school trip myself where some teachers were staggering around the corridors in the evenings. Was in the ‘90’s though, and our teachers used to pop out for a pint at lunchtime, so was probably seen as more acceptable back then.

I suspect lots of things that went on then wouldn't fly nowadays.
My only trip abroad with school was skiing in the early '90s. Once we were in ski classes for the day, the teachers certainly didn't stick around with ustypically that was 6 hours+ (barring any problems that needed them, of course), as we took packed lunches each day. One teacher was a regular on these trips: he didn't do anything else with the school outside teaching, and in fact didn't seem to warm to his pupils much. Oh, and he got me and a couple of other Year 12s to buy duty free for him on the ferryI was 17, some would have been 16--like I say, this wouldn't fly nowadays!

Also, I went on a school trip to Italy in the early 90s. It was great, because my three best friends and I all went together, and were in a big hotel room. Turned out one was SO messy, it drove us all to distraction; someone else hooked up with a local boy, and climbed out the window of the hotel to meet him; and we were all rounded up in a divey nightclub one night by a furious PE teacher, when we'd gone somewhere we shouldn't have. We were 16, it was a rite of passage!

Our teachers were also compassionate, caring, supportive, and fun. I was 16, but had never been away from my family for 10 days - and was horribly homesick. We got our exam results when we were away, and there was a lot of crying/celebration.
I remember even being able to bring a bottle of wine home for my parents - the teachers got them duty free, and put in the lockers under the bus. It was great fun, and I remember my mum picking me up from the school when we got home about 2am, with chocolate for all of the teachers to say thanks!