cost of year 6 residential trip

[waywardkitten]

Namechanged in case outing.

Our DS is at a private London primary school. He is very happy there and it suits him very well. Fees are a bit of a stretch for us, but we manage and feel (for many reasons that I won't bore you with!) that it is worth the money and sacrifices we make so he goes there.

HOWEVER, we've just been told that the cost of a 4 night residential trip within the UK in the summer term will be just over six hundred pounds. This includes transport, food and lots of amazing outdoorsy activities...but am I right in thinking this seems like an excessive amount?!

It's in England and in quite basic, dorm style accommodation...I know that state schools have similar residentials and they might cut their costs by running them off season (ie not going in May or June) but I can't help but suspect that in our case, the school is using this as a way to grab more money from parents? A year group of 80 kids paying that comes to almost 50k. There's no way 4 nights - even with instructors and what have you - costs that. Has anyone experienced similar and what did you do about it? Thanks so much.

They will have included transport costs if travelling by coach and school insurance both of which will have greatly increased in recent months and if some of the teachers or TA's going are part time they have to pay their salary while they are there during the day. Often it is the extras like this that contribute greatly to the overall cost. (For example if the coach is based locally to the school they may have to pay for 2 drivers to complete the journey there and back to drop off and again to collect).

I'm involved in organising residential trips for a youth group and prices have gone up dramatically in the last few years. The latest trip is in the UK, including coach transport, staying in basic accommodation with cheap or free excursions, using volunteers as much as possible. This is costing us more than we paid a few years ago for an overseas trip, staying on a hotel with loads of leisure facilities and using a paid event organiser. When we looked in to doing something similar this year the cost would have been far more than our members would pay.

In my area the state schools have access to subsidised accommodation for activity residentials so pupils don't pay the full cost.

I run an outdoor centre. My centre is LEA funded. Private schools can book in, but they pay a lot more. Essentially the state schools and youth groups are subsidised.

The cost you are paying sounds right for OBT or commercial centres such as Robin Wood, PGL etc. I think the transport is the killer.

DD’s was £280 in 2019. Coach trip 125 miles and came from the rural destination, which was probably cheaper than sourcing transport here as we are near major routes. Mind you the coach was very old and the accommodation very basic. Your ds will be going on a modern all bells and whistles coach. My dd is now at private school and her bus is more for a term than it was for an entire year at state school. It’s double the distance to the new school. But still, it’s a lot more than the coach to the state school just round the corner from our village.

Cross post. That explains it. I couldn’t understand why it was so cheap for the week for dd.

If you are genuinely concerned you could ask for a breakdown of cost but I think it’s a bit of a stretch to suggest the school is pocketing the difference, this would be a breach of a number of policies I’m sure. I’m not too concerned as costs have gone up hugely for food, insurance etc.

Yes I'm sure that was similar to one my dd was supposed to go on but was cancelled due to covid. It was a ridiculous amount for only 3 full days.

That will,have been subsidised, there's no way you'd get a trip for that much

Ours is £300 for two nights, including transport. State school though, so the payment is voluntary and anyone who can’t afford it will be subsidised by the rest.

Our LEA used to run an outdoors camp (tents etc) for the summer term, and as well as them organising the staffing there, they also organised the transport; groups either did Mon-Fri or Fri-Mon, and the same coaches took one group there and brought the previous one back, thus reducing overall transport costs considerably.

My year 6 went on a similar trip a few weeks ago, it was 3 nights not 4 and it was £250

Ours is costing £510 for a Monday to Friday trip including a boat and coach as well though I've got twins so twice the cost 🤦🏻‍♀️

It does sound very expensive. But I think you must expect these extras at a private school.

My DD is going in a few weeks. The cost is £350 for 4 nights. Includes 2-3 hours of coach travel to get there. Costs have risen a lot, but that is a huge amount.

The cost doesn’t sound that bad especially as a lot of state school trips are subsidised. I do know that some private schools add a a percentage onto the cost of trips. If the school is a business, they want to make a profit and therefore they do this kind of thing. If the school is a registered charity, it will be not-for-profit and they won’t.

The cost is similar to what we are paying this year (similar situation, year 6, summer term, four days, south London private school). Initial costings came in even higher but due to a change in date it came down slightly.

Our state school one is just under 600 for 4 nights. I suspect a large part of it is the coach. The letter did say to contact the school if your child wanted to go but you couldn't afford it do I assume there must be some scope to subsidise it.

Dd went to the pgl centre at Liddington in July for her year 6 residential, £500 for 4 nights including coach travel. A lot of us parents thought it was very pricey, but school said prices for pgl centres had gone up since before lockdown, especially for that centre as it had been renovated and was the most modern apparently.

They'd had complaints from previous year 6 parents that the places they chose for pgl trips weren't up to scratch and had poor accommodation, so they went for the centre that was marketed as being the most modern. Some parents were happy but most thought £500 was too much.

My year 6 child just went on a four day three night outdoor adventure residential trip, it was £134, very reasonable. That included travel, accommodation, 3 meals plus snacks, equipment and out door waterproof clothing.

There's no way 4 nights - even with instructors and what have you - costs that. So you think they’re fraudulently charging more than the cost? That seems unlikely.

^ they're trying to make a profit as they're a business! I think they're taking the piss.

Wow - thanks for all the responses! Seems to be quite a range of views on how reasonable (or not) the cost is. To answer some of the questions - they do provide transport and the coach journey is long (over 200 miles from London to the South West coast) and a few teachers from the school do go along also. The trip is in June - which of course will bump up the cost as oppose to going at a time of year where you could face bad weather.

It's a PGL-style set up and the place itself gets great reviews. I know the cost of EVERYTHING has gone up recently but the maths still seems a little mad -

80 kids x 610 pounds = 48,800

Seems a LOT of money for the school to be taking in for this, even for high-end coach transport, all activities, teacher overtime (if that's a thing)....

State schools aren't allowed to make profit on school trips, not sure what the policies are in respect of private schools

@FluffyRabbitSocks that must have been heavily subsidised

I suppose feasibly the school could be making money on it or paying the staff who are going extra - this would not happen in a state school 😆

@toomuchlaundry I don’t know the letter didn’t mention if it was, it’s a small rural school with one class of 20ish per year group.