Do your kids miss school for vacation?

[CalDisneyMomof2]

Or do you wait for holidays/summer vacation/spring break etc.?

What ages are your children?

 

[StephMK]

We only vacation on school holidays. However, for a family function, they will miss a day here and there.

Since we never know how long we'll have DH's parents (80s) and we are not local, they will miss for family events that involve travel. Or they will attend a special event out of town if family is going too.

 

[Allison]

No, never.

 

[mommasita]

This may not go well... FYI

Mine have, not a lot, but here and there... My husband and myself both work in the airline industry, and are on black out on spring break, and MANY other popular times... I always tied it into a week where they had a day or two off, so it didn't add up to much.


They are now 15, and 18, so NO , that isn't an option anymore..

Our schools don't offer the never miss a day award, and even if they did, it wouldn't bother me.. We always spoke with the teachers first, and let them know it was not THEIR job to make sure the kids caught up..

 

[Hannathy]

Never more than 1 day or 2 tops right before or after a break.

One is in college one is a high school freshman. They never wanted to miss, and once they hit 6th & up it was to hard to make up and in HS at least for my DD she had to many AP classes and classes at the college and activities like the play and musicals to miss much time.

I also think it sends a bad message because we have always told them school is their job and it is the most important thing.

 

[shoney]

We took them out of school until the oldest reached middle school.

We would look at the school calendar and try to work around days off. The one that usually worked out the best was the week after memorial day.

 

[brockash]

Yes. Mine have missed a week every Sept. when we go to Disney since they've been in school. They're now in 6th and 2nd grade. I will say that with the older one entering middle school, it is getting harder, not due to the classwork missed or even so much the teachers, for the most part they have always been supportive and cooperative, however the school as a whole or more so school district gets more strict about it in middle and high school. The other issue is sports, as my older one is really into sports and we've had to move the dates a day or two to help out with not missing as many games or something.

We'll continue to do it as long as we can. My kids have never had problems with grades and I always go in knowing that there is a lot of work involved for us, in order for them to miss school (me explaining the lessons/work they've missed and making sure they get everything done and made up etc.) So far it's worked out.

 

[CalDisneyMomof2]

This may not go well... FYI

Mine have, not a lot, but here and there... My husband and myself both work in the airline industry, and are on black out on spring break, and MANY other popular times... I always tied it into a week where they had a day or two off, so it didn't add up to much.


They are now 15, and 18, so NO , that isn't an option anymore..

Our schools don't offer the never miss a day award, and even if they did, it wouldn't bother me.. We always spoke with the teachers first, and let them know it was not THEIR job to make sure the kids caught up..

My son is in transitional kindergarten and I just ask because I wanted to know every one's point of view. I'm definitely not trying to stir anything up.

When my grandfather's funeral came up some family asked that we reschedule our trip. Well, we planned it DURING my son's spring break so he wouldn't have to miss any school. Summer was an option but my husband works for an MLB team and it's difficult for him to miss work in the middle of the season.

I have some parents say at this age it's ok once in a while to miss. My son did miss one day in the beginning of the school year to attend an out of state wedding. Other than that he's only missed because of illness.

I know it's especially difficult for families with children in different schools and both parents with jobs. I was just curious how people managed.

 

[LSmith]

Yes, my kids have missed many, many days for travel. Disney, China, Egypt, all over Europe, US and Canada etc.

I don't regret one missed day and neither do they. School will always be there.

Missing days for travel is not looked down upon here. The teachers and schools have always been supportive (save for the odd one) and tell my kids that they are lucky.

The oldest one who is in university no longer can miss days but my high school kids are still travelling during school.

 

[Art 1]

They missed a month once to travel around S. America.

 

[JVL1018]

Every year, twice a year (Sept/Oct and June) until my daughter went to middle school(6th grade).
Then we snuck in one September trip-and only bc it was my 40th birthday-and they had off for Rosh Hashanah, so they missed 4 days.

No missed school when she was in 7th and my son was in 5th.
This year(6th and 8th), they missed 3 days in November-they had Thursday and Friday off and we took them out Mon-Wed. I thought it was going to be just 2.5, but they didn't give us a half day for election day like I was hoping.

They had absolutely zero problems making up work or maintaining their grades. If they did, I wouldn't have taken them.

No more though, not with high school next year.
Between cheering and football in the fall and softball in the spring..and most importantly a bigger workload in high school, those days are over.

 

[Teresa Pitman]

My kids missed a lot of school for trips and vacations. They are adults now. Despite missing quite a few classes, they all qualified for "gifted" programs, graduated high school at the top of their classes, and attended university with scholarships. One teacher commented to one of my sons that he had the worst attendance record in the class, and the best grade.

I think schools give parents a harder time about this now, but then I just sent a note saying we were going on a trip and when we'd be back. Sometimes teachers would send homework, sometimes the kids just had to catch up a bit when they got back. They never had any trouble doing that.

North Americans workers are known for rarely taking all the vacations they are entitled too (and suffering from all kinds of stress-related illnesses) while in Europe people get many more weeks of vacation and they actually take them! Vacations are important.

TP

 

[GAGirlInVA]

No, not yet. My oldest two are homeschooled. We work REALLY hard and then we play REALLY hard.

Things may be changing this coming fall. Honestly, it is one of the hardest things in the pro/con list to get over. We also have Williamsburg about an hour away and we LOVE our family time.

 

[pigletgirl]

Growing up we never got to miss school for a vacation. I was the only kid whose parents did not allow it and I thought they were (my parents) the meanest ones!

That being said, if kids are able to be taken out and not loose what they've learned I have no problem taking them on a family vacation while they're young (like PreK-3/4th grade).

We'll see when the time comes.

 

[Gumbo4x4]

I would only take mine out if it were something date-specific. Some trips (say elk hunting) don't line up with school breaks. But, it's not something we've done yet. I would never consider it for something like Disney (for example) that can be visited year round. Additionally, my wife now works for the district and isn't permitted to take off during the school year, so it's kind of a moot point. My parents are both retired teachers, so as a kid all vacations were during the breaks too. My daughters are 13 & 8.

 

[mommasita]

My son is in transitional kindergarten and I just ask because I wanted to know every one's point of view. I'm definitely not trying to stir anything up.

When my grandfather's funeral came up some family asked that we reschedule our trip. Well, we planned it DURING my son's spring break so he wouldn't have to miss any school. Summer was an option but my husband works for an MLB team and it's difficult for him to miss work in the middle of the season.

I have some parents say at this age it's ok once in a while to miss. My son did miss one day in the beginning of the school year to attend an out of state wedding. Other than that he's only missed because of illness.

I know it's especially difficult for families with children in different schools and both parents with jobs. I was just curious how people managed.

I understand.. I wasn't saying it like you were, just have seen lots go sour..

 

[LSmith]

My kids missed a lot of school for trips and vacations. They are adults now. Despite missing quite a few classes, they all qualified for "gifted" programs, graduated high school at the top of their classes, and attended university with scholarships. One teacher commented to one of my sons that he had the worst attendance record in the class, and the best grade.

I think schools give parents a harder time about this now, but then I just sent a note saying we were going on a trip and when we'd be back. Sometimes teachers would send homework, sometimes the kids just had to catch up a bit when they got back. They never had any trouble doing that.

North Americans workers are known for rarely taking all the vacations they are entitled too (and suffering from all kinds of stress-related illnesses) while in Europe people get many more weeks of vacation and they actually take them! Vacations are important.

TP

My kids are honour students and top athletes in the city. Even if they were struggling students we would still pull them for trips. Although school is important, it's no more important than many other aspects of living life. Life is too short as it is.

Europeans and Asians travel much, much more with their children than North Americans.

 

[MichelleVW]

Yep we did...and continued it during high school. Tried to do it around school holidays so they didn't miss much. But they would miss days here and there and still graduated at the top of the class. Maybe if they struggled in school we wouldn't have done it...but vacations are important to our family and my husband can't get off when normal people do...so we took vacations when we could.

 

[SLP958]

DS will be missing a week next year for a trip. He will
Be in 1st grade.

I will take my kids out for trips as long as possible. There are lots of things to see and do in this world. Missing a few days if school in the big picture will make no difference.

 

[gray52]

We take our kids out of school every year for vacations. It's when it makes the most economic sense so that's when we take them. Our school allows 10 excused educational days and we used all 10 this year... Used 7 last year... Will use 6-7 next year. Our two kids are in 2nd and 3rd grades respectively. Never one issue.

IMO, it doesn't matter how many days your kids miss... It's about the parents... Not the kids. Good parenting = good students.

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