I just wanted to put this out there to everyone because I’m very angry about the way my children’s service school has started to advertise and allocate places on day and residential school trips. My son brought home a letter on a Friday last November regarding a trip to Belgium to visit the war graves memorial. I went over the weekend to pay and found out on the Monday that all the places were already taken within a few hours and he could not go.
Yesterday, I received a tweet from the school saying that the Year 8 residential trip will be the same; first come first served basis, with it “ going live” Monday morning. I wrote to the Headmaster saying how unfair this was on all parents, particularly those on Universal Credit and the whole structure of this what I call. “Glastonbury scramble” way of organising who goes. Basically, if you can’t afford £300 plus up front on the morning, your child cannot attend the trip. Our primary school was not like this! He replied saying he agreed with me and that things would be changed so that more pupils could go on trips and spread the cost. That was last month. He certainly hasn’t acted on it yet.
Is this a new policy or do all secondary schools operate like this? It’s just so unfair and it’s the children who miss out. My kids school is a normal comp in Kent, not a grammar or wealthy independent school. The are many children on free school meals and I am just appalled really. It puts parents under so much unfair pressure. Does any one face the same issues with this schools or is it just Kent ?