Lack of school residential trips...

[StrongerThongs]

Full prepared to be told IABU because Covid, teacher stress, cost of living crisis etc BUT I have a DD in Y9 who has never been on a residential school trip, either in the UK or overseas. Her primary school were unable to offer a Y6 trip due to Covid.

Pre-covid the secondary school she is now at offered several opportunities a year but this has been reduced to one massively oversubscribed and prohibitively expensive ski trip every two years (the last one was to Colorado!) and a couple of subject-specific trips for KS4 (eg. languages trips, geography field trips).

Instead school have decided to run an activities week in the summer term for all pupils which includes a bunch of paid days out (eg theatre trips, museums, escape rooms) or the opportunity to stay in school for free activities (sports). This seems like a bit of a crap alternative and frankly a waste of a week's education!

I get that school trips take a lot of planning and I am NOT knocking teachers but I believe they offer really important opportunities for developing confidence, resilience, independence etc particularly for children who have missed so much due to Covid.

FWIW this is a successful oversubscribed state school. At my own bog-standard comprehensive I was able to go skiing in Italy, canoeing in France, fell-walking in the Lakes as well as field/language trips and I'm not from a wealthy background - trips were affordable/subsidised. Obviously times have changed.

Interested to know what other schools offer? And if IABU for thinking DD's school could do better?

Your childs education is your responsibility. You can choose to take them to the theatre, museums, escape room ect whenever you like.

If you had the means to send them on a school ski trip you have the means to send them yourself.

The ski trip will take place because it will not be linked to the curriculum - so we are allowed to insist on payment.

Our school has just done a 3 night / 4 day trip to Barcelona over half term, cost £895.

My children didn't go on any school organised trips, too expensive, but they toured with their choir and their orchestra (not the same year!) this year dd is touring to the far east, fully funded by corporate sponsors

I am a secondary school teacher and I have organised week long camps in the past, taken large groups on DofE expeditions etc.

My school has also cut back on visits (though still run DofE which is brilliant) for all the reasons listed above including staffing and parental income.

Just to add from my personal experience, having run 5 residential visits: 2 parents ever said thank you; average 4 hours sleep a night; often 1 hospital visit per week long camp adding a lot of extra stress; dealing with typical teen behaviour all week.

The kids always got lots out of the visits but I couldn't countenance it now.

I am a TA in a primary school (I know the OP post is about secondary school but the points, I believe, are still valid).
I work part time (mornings only) but there is no extra pay for a residential - I am still only paid for mornings, despite working pretty much 24hrs a day on a residential.
I am woken most nights by kids upset/homesick/friend issues/unwell/wanting attention/wanting comfort.
It is mentally and physically exhausting.
DH has to use his precious annual leave to cover my absence - within our family my role is looking after the kids after school and ferrying them to their activities. This means sacrificing one week of time together as a family on annual leave.
Parents always moan - it’s either too costly or we seen doing enough.
Parents always complain about something- they have unrealistic expectations of what we can do as teachers regarding friendships/homesickness/getting kids to eat or sleep or anything you can think of really.

I think teachers who give up days of their own holidays to run these things are a vanishing breed. It's a huge amount to give over and above a demanding day job, and morale is just too low these days.

I emailed the teacher who ran the one trip my Dd's been on to say thank you, and she replied saying I'd made her day. A thank you should be standard from everyone, it should not have made her day. (Maybe she was just being polite? 🤷‍♀️)

It's very true. I took 60 children away last year and one parent said thank you. It was really appreciated.

My sons school is similar in that they have a week towards the end of the summer term, when all teachers and all students are off timetable. There is a range of activities from trips abroad, to unusual crafts in the classroom that teachers run. Parents pay so the less you can afford, the less interesting your week is! But i assume payment can be compulsory as there are free alternatives.

I think staffing trips must be very hard. I would not want to be responsible for a load of teens away from home.

At my school, staff going on a residential trip during term time had to organise their own cover for lessons missed by begging for favours from other teachers! Nightmare situation which pretty much stopped term time trips from being organised.

I went on one to Paris which was mainly in the holidays but the final days travelling meant the coach got back to the school at 7am after driving through the night. I had to teach that day as normal, after being awake most of the night! That was the last time I volunteered to go on a residential trip!

The activities week you are complaining about seems completely normal and a great opportunity for kids to have some fun experiences with school friends.

it is disappointing that more trips are being run but I can understand why. So many risk assessments and safe guarding issues to consider. Parents demand more. My DC are at two different schools. One had her first trips in year 10 to Germany and also and overnight to London as a reward for volunteering at school (although we paid). She is going on a Geography field trip to Iceland in Year 11. She has ASD and the school has bent over backwards to accommodate her including sending an additional TA. I am beyond grateful and made that very clear to the staff.

My other DD is in year 8. She just about managed her year 5 residential, in year 6. But they all got sent home early when someone's sibling at home got CoVID. She is doing her year 8 activity week abroad and going away in Autumn term in year 9 as well. I am really grateful to the school for this. Her year group is very challenging so I admire any teacher brave enough to take them anywhere.

Dd is year 10.
There was a ski trip this half term. Massively oversubscribed, about £1000.
Vastly overpriced netball/football trip to Dubai. Doubt they will get the numbers. Originally this was a trip to Sri Lanka.
Language trips. Spanish to Barcelona.
French to Normandy for a week £350 ish?

I think morale is also very low at the moment, so many teachers will be reluctant to go above and beyond for parents and children who don't appreciate it (in fact, honestly, parents are the worst part of my job and I am not currently inclined to do any extras)

I don’t see why they don’t run them.

Really?! They take a massive amount of organisation and teachers don't have spare time to do this. Plus schools are finding it almost impossible to get enough supply staff to cover the lessons of teachers who are absent due to sickness or training. Voluntarily creating more need for cover is not something schools will do lightly.

My school still runs exchange trips in all three of the languages we teach. That's a whole other level of paperwork and organisation, what with all the communication with the foreign school, pairing students with suitable partners, running DBS checks on parents etc. I'll probably be in charge of one of the exchanges next year and I'm absolutely dreading it tbh. The trip itself is great, but there is do much potential for things to go wrong.

My school is running loads this year, (too many imo), there was a deliberate effort to make up for the Covid years & the fact that many students such as OP’s dc had never been on a residential.

They do take a massive amount of organising & as most are non curriculum, are reliant on parents ability to pay.

Because of the cost of supply teachers many schools now restrict these to weekends or school holidays. But as others have said, then teachers have to give up their own time to go.

I would guess many schools are also wary because of the huge problems getting refunds for trips that were cancelled during the first lockdown (PGL were particularly unhelpful). Covid is still very much going round though obviously restrictions have been lifted.

you dont see why teachers dont volunteer to take on the endless hours of planning and paperwork for the dubious pleasure of giving up their holiday and weekend time to be in charge of a bunch of teens who could get themselves hurt, killed or in serious trouble with the local police, and then have their parents make a complaint against them?

I’ve just come back from a 3 day trip with girl guides. We’ve had parents complain re cost. Parents complain re paperwork (if they’d only seen the amount of risk assessment etc) A Sunday evening parents meeting. So many hours planning, booking, spent answering parents questions. The stress of keeping children safe. There was that case of teachers being prosecuted in France recently when a water activity at an centre went wrong - charges dismissed but hung over them for years. All unpaid I’m am a volunteer. I needed to use a days annual leave to recover! We did have a fabulous time and some parents thanked us.
There’s an international guides trip next year and take up is low - cost and fact parents/children are more wary going away now post Covid I think. I certainly wouldn’t be rushing to offer a trip as a teacher.
Pgl does offers - mine went on a 2 night taster booked last minute.

You need to vote the Tories out

I'm a teacher.

Few years ago I tried to organise several different trips. Not enough pupils wanted to go to make it worth it.

Now behaviour is that appalling sod giving up my weekend to spend more time with children other than my own.

UWhatNow
I don’t see why they don’t run them.
See all the shit on here teachers get for just being teachers.

I think teachers have enough to do with all the pointless paperwork they are already expected to do, covering staff who have left the profession as opposed to spending time on risk assessment forms ( have you ever seen these for a school trip they are ludicrously long winded.) and then having to reorganise their own families / pay for additional childcare etc. in order to supervise a trip where they are on duty 24/7 for the time they are away potentially during the holidays.

Be thankful your DCs have teachers on the school premises before you start complaining about residential trips!

It’s expecting staff to work for free. They are on duty 24/7. Home life still has to go on so you need to pay for childcare, dog walking etc but aren’t earning anything to pay for it.

Private school teacher.
I have run them in the past but haven't resumed since Covid. We are not allowed to miss any curriculum days so have to give up holidays - I also have children, it involves being away from them. It's not a core part of my job description and I'm not paid for any of the organization or giving up my time. Basically it involves doing my normal job plus being a part time travel agent - it's literally 100s of hours of planning. Parents are often very demanding in the run up and very few say thank you. It's also hard to emphasise how stressful it is taking 50 of other people's children abroad/on a plane etc. I've had incidents before where students fell seriously ill and I had to stay on abroad with them, were seriously poorly behaved on trips etc and parents refused to collect them.

My DD had a residential PGL type trip in year 7 (pre covid) which she didn't really enjoy because she doesn't like that type of thing but it was a year group trip. Then due to covid nothing, not even any day trips, in years 8-11. She's going on a residential trip next month with her A level class.
I said if there wasn't a trip organised, I would take her somewhere myself for a weekend. There is a trip organised and I'm not entirely sure it's cheaper than a DIY trip for 2 but she'll enjoy it more with friends and, as a shy, not particularly confident student I think it will be better for her to go without me. If it had been available in year 8 or 9, at that point we would probably have struggled to afford it.

I think when people are looking at the cost of school trips, being good value (for what's covered) and being affordable to most, are not always the same thing.

The last trip I ran was a year ago. Not allowed on a school day.
So three staff, 25 kids, on a Saturday. From the north to London on the train. Staff paid for their own places.
Both parents and students were really grateful.
BUT I won't do trips that I don't want to go on, and I won't do trips I'm not happy to pay to go on. And if staff don't pay, the cost per student goes up.