Once in a lifetime trip - 3 weeks off school

[XMissPlacedX]

My daughter has always wanted to go to Disney world Florida, but due to funds I've not been able to afford it. She is 14.

Her aunty who is quite well off and has a daughter the same age (my dd's cousin ) goes to Disney world Florida every 2 years and has offered to take my dd next year for 3 weeks.

The problem is it's the first 3 weeks of the school term ( September 2024). I've asked her if there was anyway of going in the summer holidays and she said it would double their cost and it would be cheaper for them to pay the school fine .

What do I do ? Do I say yes or no ? I would love for my dd to go but am not sure how much the fine would be and what impact missing that amount of school would cause.

I'm really torn

We all know school grades over the 5 Cs in our day is a waste of time and effort and will have zero impact on later life!

It's different now. Achieving better grades at GCSE opens more doors and offers more opportunities at 16. It's disingenuous to think otherwise. And it's more difficult to get even an unskilled job without English and maths GCSEs.

The "in my day" posts are irrelevant. Of course there are people who didn't do well academically who are doing well now, but why deliberately make it harder for someone? And why send the message that the instant gratification of a Disney holiday is more important than education, because it simply isn't.

I have no doubt that the OP's caught could catch up, but it just makes life more difficult and stressful for her.

It's still the autumn term so you could get work off teachers or a student in the year above, or just ask what topics they will be covering. Then she can use 3 weeks in the summer holidays to learn it. Home learning is much more efficient than school learning so she will probably be well ahead when she gets back.

It’s interesting how people think schools facilitate learning when dc cannot be bothered to attend. They don’t. How does anyone learn at age 14 without guidance? What about discussion? Group work? Experiments and maths concepts? Art and practical subjects? All sorts of learning is difficult to do on your own.

One aspect that’s being overlooked is getting back with friends and starting out in new GCSE classes. Not being there excluded dc from the social side of school too.

Auto correct on my kindle is the bane of my life, even though I have switched spellchecker off.
caught = daughter

(It even corrected bane to babe FGS!)

Absolutely rampant totally agree. Maybe if you have a less academic child doing a more vocational course.

Dd1 is currently applying to do a very academic yet very popular course at several RG universities - courses are all massively over subscribed. Damn right they will use your gcse results to knock candidates out of the process - you are 17 pre a level there’s not much else they have to go on.

She worked like mad got half 8s half 9s. Offers coming in. Like hell would she have missed even a week of school voluntarily. She genuinely wouldn’t have wanted to. That’s why she will succeed. They get long enough holidays after the exams. Sadly my friends son who is bright but dossed about and got 6s and 7s and also now wants to do a similar course is struggling for offers and kicking himself. It’s not 1993 anymore.

Tizer a friends Dd has missed chunks of year 10 due to mental health caused by awful life events. The school said all the right things but they are not able to in reality help her catch up and she’s now in foundation level having been top student. Mum at wits end. They were put in that position. Voluntarily missing school in years 10/11 blows my mind.

My cousin is earning NMW at 54. He didn’t go to uni either.

what’s your point?

Many unis even look down on 7s at GCSE level, it's that competitive.

The difference between a 3 & a 4 can make a massive difference as well. Literally one mark can mean the difference between moving on in college and having to repeat the GCSE. Knew two devastated 16yos this year who got unexpected 3s.

Just annoyed me when dimwit adults come out with the “GCSEs don’t matter” nonsense. Maybe not if you are doing beauty therapy but they do for law or economics love.

I think you have to seriously know your child.

My child have been poorly with an unknown illness since February of this year. Her attendance up until the school holidays was 69%. She missed the first 10 days of Y10 due to us being on holiday. That coupled with days off poorly and endless hospital appointments, we're currently at 88%. She is EXCELLING at school. Some she is middle-ground such as French, but for core English, Maths, science and history, school are incredibly pleased with her.

So, I'd say if you know your child well, you will know about her ability to catch up. If she remains ok health wise, we are holidaying the last week of Y10, and the first 8 days of Y11. And I KNOW she will catch up.

No one else on her knows your child or her ability to make sense of what she has missed. Only you can make that choice. If it was my child, she would be on that plane.

Why would you make life more difficult for your child though? I get missing the last week of year 10 but why world you choose to miss the first week of year 11? Op hasn’t chosen the timing this trip it’s been thrust upon her. Sorry I just find it quite hard to understand of all the weeks in the year you choose that one key first week if term when she has already missed through illness?

@TheaBrandt it doesn't make life difficult for her. It's the same week we have gone for years. The only year we didn't do it was when she started year 7. I get people will have opinions, same as they are for OP. What im saying is that no one can say what's best for her child. You have to know your child and their ability. I also think a lot rides on the school and what they do during these missing weeks - which in my case is not a lot. It's a lot of "settling in", binding of work books and shuffling of time tables.

Could you offer to pay the difference between the trip+fine in term time and the trip in the summer for both girls? Otherwise can your DD not just go for a week? (3 weeks in Disneyland is way too much surely even if you're a Disney fan). I wouldn't miss 3 weeks at the start of GCSEs.

I still think it is shocking people “are creating memories” at Disneyworld and saying it is okay for a teenager to miss 3 weeks of compulsory school for that. We are not talking about an educational destination like Rome, Berlin, Florence but the worst form of commercialism and tourist trap.

Life is certainly too short to waste an extremely important part of it on an unnecessary trip to a theme park in the godforsaken, uncultured hell hole of Florida.

My two teens were absolutely desperate not to miss the first week of autumn term we went away 2020 and I actually organised emergency flights and paid out to ensure they wouldn’t have to quarantine as the rules changed while we were away.

It’s not just”paper shuffling” in year 11. Your child is then on the back foot having to catch up with everyone else. Why inflict that on yourself through choice? You do you I guess but not a choice I would ever make for my teens. You’ve got all summer to go away!

Anyone who thinks it's fine to miss 3 weeks of the start of GCSE syllabus has "Live, Laugh, Love" cushions and prints.

Fact.

While I have made my views clear that taking time out of the first 10 days of year 10 is inadvisable, I think the demonising of a Disney holiday is unnecessary and unfair.

DD (23) loves Disney and theme parks in general. It is one of her ambitions to visit as many Disney theme parks as she can. So far she has just been to Paris and Orlando.

I also enjoyed Disney. But to call it a “once in a lifetime trip” which is deemed more important than education is insane!

She is only 14 - she has a lot of lifetime ahead to do Disney (I went at 29 and then took the family aged 42 - it was something my dad always wanted to do for us but couldn’t)

Thank you for giving me a very good laugh on a very dreary morning 😆

It's not just the lost time, it's the message. It's OK to skip weeks of something important and serious because you want to go to a theme park. So later on she may well think, you know what, I won't bother to go to the lectures, I feel like partying and sleeping for the next three weeks instead, I am young and having fun so that's also important. I'll catch up somehow like I did before...

I agree with those saying it depends on the child. We don't have fines in Scotland but parents who keep their kids off during eg their highers are then often totally unrealistic about how easily they'll be able to catch up - most don't do any extra work to make up for it then many of the parents get the hump when they fail prelims or final exams. If a kid genuinely will put in a lot of work to catch up it can be fine (especially at 14) but it definitely does have a significant impact - I've seen kids miss 3 weeks in S5/6 (holidays, illness, late starts) and never really catch up as it also makes them feel out of the loop so affects their confidence. Up to that late stage I have no issue with parents taking kids on holiday as the prices outside term time are so high. The 10 day compromise wounds reasonable to me.

Why those 3 weeks though. Orlando doesn’t follow the sane rules of off peak and peak as other places, July-September is all value season hotel prices would be the same and US schools go back mid August. Fitting it in the school holidays with the potential fines gains v little apart from perhaps slightly cooler weather