Just back from All Stars-Pop Warner drove us crazzzy!!!

[mrsheppo]

We just got back from ASMusic. Arrived on Dec 7, supposed to arrive on the 6th but flight was cancelled, long miserable story there. We were given 2 rooms in the Jazz building with a courtyard view. We later found out that we were the only non-Pop Warner guests on the entire floor.

During most of the nights, kids were running up and down the hallways, screaming, banging on our doors and pounding on the railings like they were drums. Chaperones were nowhere to be seen.

I think I called Security almost every night because of the noise and the pounding on our doors. I even went out and asked some of the kids to tone down the noise because I had a headache and all I got was a bunch of obscenities launched at me.

Our family really liked the All Stars but next time I will book a moderate in order to avoid the youth groups. I had 4 kids with me (teenagers and young adults) and I hope they would never act this way and ruin someone else's vacation.

Sorry for the vent.

 

[seastar]

We are just back from POR. We saw lots of cheerleaders at the food court and they were very ENERGETIC as only teens can be!! However, we never heard a peep in our room. I suppose there were many more at All Stars. Sorry for your problem.

 

[crazyforgoofy]

It seems the resorts would do a better job of either keeping the youth groups segregated from the rest of the guests or have lots of security. The same thing happened to us last year but at POFQ, banging on the door in the middle of the night, ringing the phone at all hours yelling and screaming outside the doors. Thank goodness it was only our last night or I'd have had a bigger fit than I did.

What were you told when you complained?

 

[Misti]

Sorry to hear about that! Behavior like that is SO inconsiderate!

Noise and rude behavior can be anywhere . We "splurged" a few years back and booked a stay at the GF Main Building Concierge. It was a real stretch for us and we hoped it would be a memorable stay. Well, what became MOST memorable was the screaming family next door, constantly arguing. We had a "connecting" room with the door in between which made it seem like they were right in the room with us! I felt so badly for the kids--they were young. The mother was CONSTANTLY screaming at them and her husband. We tried to move but it was over Valentine's Day weekend and the resort was full.

 

[epcotfan]

Noise and rude behavior can be anywhere .

I agree. I stayed at AKL and couldn't believe how many rude guests I encountered.

On the flip side I stayed at ASMu a couple of years ago when the cheerleaders were there and the girls were so nice. Very polite. I was staying in the Jazz building and had no complaints at all. The only minor issue that occured was when the bus driver from Epcot encouraged the girls to do cheers the whole ride back There was a family on the bus that just got their newborn back to sleep and the cheers were scaring it. Once the girls got word of what was going on they stopped.

Maybe it depends on who their chaperone is? In middle school I took a class trip and there was no way we'd try any of what the original poster mentioned. The teacher chaperones scared the crap out of us.

 

[Bojangles]

did you ask to be moved to another part of the resort?

 

[sharoncity]

I'm sorry to hear you had a bad expierience with ASMu. I'm even more sorry to say I'm associated with Pop Warner. We went to New Hampshire for our Regional Competition. I couldn't believe the behavior of some of the kids (brothers were worse than the girls.) The parents were there; I could not believe they let their kids run around and trash a hotel like that. For our Association, at least one parent has to accompany the child to Florida - so that sad behavior can't even be blamed on poor chaperones - it's the PARENTS! I guess if I were going at that time of year I'd splurge on moderate or deluxe and hope for the best. Better yet, I'd try to plan on the following week. Pop Warner Competition is always the first or second week of December. Hope the rest of your trip was magical!

 

[crazy4wdw]

We just returned from a week stay at the Contemporary. One of the Pop Warner Cheerleader groups were dining at Chef Mickey's about 7:30 one morning and they were performing their cheers and blowing whistles! We were already up so it wasn't any big deal, however I'm sure there were other guests in rooms over the restaurant area of the Tower who were not too happy. You could easily hear them through the door to the room. I went out on the balcony area in front of our room and you could see the cheerleaders at various tables chating their cheers and occasionally blowing whistles- the CM's were encouraging them.

 

[tjmw2727]

I am So sorry this happened, we had a similar situation two years ago at Sports.

If you can take a minute and jot down a letter to the manager of the resort that my help make things better in the future. Perhaps a list if the mgrs you called and the dates and times of the door banging phone ringing. Site the reason the mgr/front desk gave you for not moving you away from the group. IMHO that's the least they could do!

Hopefully if enough of us give honest although negative feedback on the behaviour of "some" of these groups Dinsey will address the situation. At least keep the groups in the same building or require more supervision. I think a 24/7 security guard in the building with the groups should be considered.

Personally I think this is one area where Disney is "dropping the ball" and sould be doing much better in regards to all groups. Especially the unsupervised (or undersupervised) groups of kids.

I know we were on Cape Cod one summer when my kids were small 2 & 4yso. We were up all night with a group of older teens/20s. One call to the front dest resulted in the breakup of the party/ more security and a slight room discount for us. (All we really wanted was quiet!).

TJ

 

[DisneyMim]

I am sorry too that you had to put up with so much noise. I just wanted to post though that don't think this just happens at the values. As others have said youth groups stay in the moderates also. I know our schools in this area always stay in the moderates when they travel to WDW. Also a few years ago my sister stayed at the Poly and there was a huge soccer group staying there. They were right smack in the middle of them. I agree with the poster that said that Disney should try to maybe put them together in one area and not put people in that area that are not associated with the groups. I don't think it would be that hard to do. Groups are big business for Disney, I think we all understand that, but that doesn't mean that the rest of us should have to "put up" with them. And I also have to agree with the posters about the screaming family at the GF. We had one next to us at the Poly Concierge, so it CAN happen anywhere.

Hope you had a great time anyway!!!!!

 

[tjmw2727]

I agree mim about finding groups anywhere and rude people anywhere. I just can't imagine these people doing these things and or getting away with it if they were not a group. You rarely see individuals or families running the halls, singing, cheering and ringing phones etc. I think that if any one person or family were to behave like this security would take care if it asap - I don't always find this with groups.

Being part of a group takes away the feeling of individual responsiblity even for adults - so definately for kids. I think that when Disney accomodates these groups they should be better prepared to handle the unique problems and situations that groups bring.

- ohh sorry abut the soapbox.

 

[trola2]

Barbara, you are not alone. WE were at ASMu at the same time. A planned split stay and we moved to POR last Wednesday. At ASMu, it was totally awful. Kids everywhere. Maybe one adult to 12 kids. I'm not exaggerating, either. On Tues I was peacefully doing laundry at 8AM all by myself and in pop 11 cheergirls with no chapperone to wait out the rain. They had just arrived and wouldn't be in a room until 3. Not a good way to start my day, combined with dryers that didn't seem to want to dry stuff!!lol

We also called the desk several times and although in the past we've always had a quiet stay and never heard a noise, it was not the case at ASMu last week.

We have resolved that we will NEVER go to Disney during pop warner again. We've been during this time before, but never run into the problems we did. BTW, the behavior at POR from the groups was totally different. Much better behaved.

We've decided to try offsite in February so we will know what we need to do next December. We just know we won't be at the all stars!!

~~Beth

 

[Jaklackus]

In this area students can only miss so many days of school before they start losing percentages of their grades...since pop warner is not related to school I can't imagine that it would be an excused absence. Maybe it's just me being jealous since we have to schedule all of our trips around SS's vacation schedule(only to leave him behind since he blows off homework and loses all privledges including vacation...every year)..I know when I was in school after 5 missed days I would have automatically been held back.

 

[mrsheppo]

Thanks for the support. They offered to move us to a room in Country Fair but I didn't want to be so far from the food courts and transportation. The rooms were fine, it wasn't so much problems with the cheerleaders as it was the football players. They were thoroughly rude to everyone, at least the ones on our floor. On our last night, security finally came to our room to talk to us. The wonderful guard, Dick sympathized with us and he finally got ahold of the chaperones and warned to group to knock off the noise and antics. Later in the evening, he was having to deal with more of them in the food court and gift shops. Like others have said, if individuals and families acted this way, Disney wouldn't tolerate it.

 

[tallyfamily]

We were at ASMovies this past week for just one night. We were in the Mighty Ducks section and did not notice any cheerleaders staying near us, however they were in other sections at ASMovies. Our biggest problems were the girls not understanding the concept of waiting in line for buses. When they arrived at the busstop they would just walk right up to the front along the outside even though the rest of us had been waiting in line for 15 or 20 minutes. Also on the very crowded buses it didn't occur to any of them to give up their seat to older folks or adults with infants/toddlers.

 

[pooh6890]

Sorry folks to disagree, but I see no problem at all with noise and cheering around the hotels, restaurants or the bus. They are there to have fun as well as the other guests. Where I draw the line is at night and THEN that is where the noise should be controlled. After 10:00, the chaperones as well as security at the hotels should be out in full force to make sure they don't disturb the other guests. I have chaperoned many times for Elementary, Middle and High School and never had any problems keeping the kids quiet and contained at night. Let's let everyone enjoy their vacation. Besides, any of the hotels will try to change your room if you are really bothered by these groups.

 

[tjmw2727]

Originally posted by pooh6890
Sorry folks to disagree, but I see no problem at all with noise and cheering around the hotels, restaurants or the bus. They are there to have fun as well as the other guests. Where I draw the line is at night and THEN that is where the noise should be controlled. After 10:00, the chaperones as well as security at the hotels should be out in full force to make sure they don't disturb the other guests. I have chaperoned many times for Elementary, Middle and High School and never had any problems keeping the kids quiet and contained at night. Let's let everyone enjoy their vacation. Besides, any of the hotels will try to change your room if you are really bothered by these groups.

Of course they should have fun and enjoy the hard earned trips. The problem is that often they are doing it at the expense of other guests. Cuttling in line for an attraction or bus is not ok no matter who does it, its not just having fun. Combing hair and putting on makeup at the food court is just both rude and unsanitary. We also had lots of problems with line cutting at the food court. Groups walking up to people in front and adding their orders. I know families do this, and that's not ok either but its not usually 10-15 family members adding one more pizza or sandwich each.

I have no problems with the use of the pool or even cheering "outside" and just the general noise of a group, during the day. I do have problems with the other issues I mentioned, inside cheering and rule breaking.

Obvoiusly not all groups participate in this but they are becoming more common and giving even the best behaved groups a bad reputation. I was on the bus with a very nice group last year who were obviously well chaperoned and did give up several seats for babies and elders.

My point is that when they are misbehaving Disney should do more to insure the fun, safety and comfort of all its guests.

I received so many prank calls at Sports I had to have them turn off my telephone. No Mickey wake up calls and no calls from DH but no more calls at all hours of the evening.

TJ

edited for spelling

 

[mrsheppo]

I have no problems with anyone wanting to have fun while they are there. I didn't have problems with the cheering during the day outside, but what I objected to was the constant banging on the railings like drums, the banging on our doors at all hours of the night, like 1:00 and 2:00am. They even one night left a note on our door telling us that hookers were waiting for us in another room. The only time I saw chaperones were finally on our last day and they were out smoking a cigarette on the balcony and watching these kids spit over the railing into the bushes below.

 

[hammertime]

Sounds like bad Chaperones to me. I traveled many places with my high school band back in the day. When we stayed at hotels we were put on two floors one for boys and one for girls. The Chaperones were on the floor with us.

We always had a lights out time and the Chaperones would come and do bed checks. Of course we found ways around this but that meant that we had to be quite while disobeying. The poor Chaperones actually took turns at night patrolling the floor to ensure quite and order.

Maybe Disney needs to but more responsiblity on the Chaperones and if the Chaperones can't control their kids then they all go home or get kicked out of the hotel. If my band members and I had acted like the kids above they would have had no problem putting us on a plane for home early.

 

[sharoncity]

You know, if Disney would just make it clear that if the kids in any group don't behave, they'll be kicked out, the kids might actually take notice. These Pop Warner kids worked really hard and competed to get there. If they were faced with being kicked out (and warned far before they arrived), I think they would be better behaved. Or at least the chaperones and parents would take more interest/notice. To have a chance at a National Title and then lose it because you behave like barbarians.....
Maybe Disney will get wind of all this (hint hint) and try to do something for everyone. I know these groups are really big business for disney (probably about 10,000 kids for Pop Warner plus family members....), but everyone else is a paying guest also.