How do you think a school should handle this? (lateness/school trip)

[DebbieFiderer]

If a primary school class (KS1) were going on a school trip, for which they need to leave early (before school would normally have started), what do you think should happen if a child hasn't arrived by the time they need to leave? If it makes a difference, imagine it is a child who is habitually late (15-30 mins late every day).

I'm trying not to be too specific as it is (or could be) a real situation at our school, but not one which I am directly involved in as either a parent or staff. I am just curious as to what people think would/should happen in this situation. Should the whole trip be delayed (possibly by up to 45 mins, which with the increase in traffic could mean more than an hour of the planned activities affected), or should the trip go ahead as planned and the child miss out if they are late?

I would ring the habitually late parent the day before to remind them to be on time. If they were still late, then the child either goes in to another class for the day, or the parent can chase the coach and meet them at the destination.

That said, we never have trips that leave before the official start time of school, and not usually until 30 mins after bell time, so if the child misses out, then they really can't blame anyone but the parent. There is no 'I forgot we we going earlier' excuse.

kindle, surely even picking them up on the way would have been risky? If they weren't ready when you arrived, how long did you give them before you ended up being late yourself?

And if they were ready to go the moment you arrived, why couldn't their own parent bring them?

We had this. A member of staff pre-arranged to pick the child up from home if they looked likely to miss it (home v close to school). Staff member had to do the pick up in the end.

rhonda I used to give one a ten minute window whilst I listened to the radio and the other one was never late for me.
In both cases the mums were, if I am being charitable, in need of extra support (one was married to an alcoholic), the other one overstretched with younger children (I know that feeling) and both families had moved out of the immediate school catchment so commute was longer. It was a risk, yes, but a calculated one. One of the kids was very very smart and did go to uni/end up teaching. She, like me at that age, knew qualifications would mean escape from a crappy-but not-so-crappy-child-protection-could-intervene home life.

It is tricky for some families when school trips set off earlier than normal school start and I don't think schools should underestimate this.

Its tricky for some teachers too but for one day a year ....

A habitually late child in my DS class lives on our route to school. DS came home one day saying 'I think a good idea would be to call on X in the morning so they can walk with us' X isn't a close friend of DS so I thought it odd but after some gentle questioning this idea turns out to have come from their teacher. So now X is never late and is always waiting for us with all necessary uniform/equipment for the day but not an adult to be seen in the house. X says there is someone in but they are in bed.

They go on a lot more trips than one a year mrz , at our school anyway, it is a very small school though (50 pupils) so that might not be the norm.
The other thing that irks me is that the starting and finishing point it is often not at the school, and this is supposed to pose no problems to parents who have another child to get to school at the same time and then work in a different direction again.

DD had a school trip on Friday, they left 20 minutes earlier than normal school time starts.

DD came home the day before saying that if you weren't there on time, they would leave without you.

I don't know if anyone was actually left behind. But I think it was totally reasonable for the school to take that stance, and warn all the children that was what would happe

Well all I will say is, those who said the habitually late manage to be on time for trips are right!

If there are no other issues in the household then surely setting your alarm 20 minutes earlier is all that needs to be done to be at school 20 minutes earlier, what other trickiness is there may