DisneyPiPhi
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- May 1, 2008
- Messages
- 1,386
Background Information: I teach 7th and 8th grade language arts at a charter school in Kissimmee-St. Cloud. Being a preK-8 school, we make kind of a big deal of 8th grade graduation since the kids have been with us for so long.
How it all started....
My roommate/our guidance counselor e-mailed me in early April saying that she'd gotten an advertisement from Disney about some 8th grade event and did I want to take the 8th graders? I told her to bring the stuff down to my room. Apparently, Disney Grad Night is like a right of passage for graduating high school seniors in the Central Florida 8th graders that my roommate and a lot of our other staff members remember going to. After reading the information from Disney and poking around on the internet, I learned that Grad Jam is the little sister of Grad Night - a scaled-down graduation celebration specifically for 8th graders. This year, it was held at Hollywood Studios from 6pm-1am. The event features rides (obviously), food, and a DJ dance party under the Sorcerer's Hat. After reading about the event, I decided to bite the bullet and formed a committee to plan the event.
The extended, awful, problem-plagued planning process....
The first step was to find transportation. My planning committee comrade, Karen, called our approved charter bus provider and found out that all the charter buses in the area were completely booked for the event! We pretty much thought we were done at that point until Karen decided to call our county transportation office and ask about other approved charter bus services. The woman on the phone at transportation services magically announced that she would let us have a school bus! We couldn't believe this because usually we can only use the buses for field trip between 9am and 1pm - we couldn't believe we could have a bus out until 2am! So that was the first roadblock that we managed to navigate.
Roadblock #2: Reading the paperwork, I discovered that we were supposed to have purchased our tickets over a month ago, despite receiving the materials only two weeks before. We got on the phone to Disney Youth Groups and luckily spoke to a woman whose brother was a student at our school (DYG is in Celebration, FL, only about 10 miles down the road.) She reserved us a place without any form of paperwork or payment, bless her heart. We just had to promise to get everything in ASAP. (Paperwork reserving tickets and payment, essentially.)
Then it was time to tell the students. Of course, they freaked out. Being from the area, many have CMs in the family, but none get to have the park closed just for themselves and their friends until 1am. We held an 8th grade assembly to inform them of the event and hand out information.
Next came the selection process, a very official meeting held over beers and blue cheese dip at Hurricane Grill and Wings on Sand Lake Road. The interested 8th graders had to submit a paragraph to me detailing how they planned to act maturely and responsibly at the event. The selection process pretty much consisted of us giggling at the cute things they wrote in their paragraphs and deciding everyone could go as long as they didn't get in any hot water at school between then an May 9.
The next Monday, I posted the list of accepted students, which of course caused a general uproar. We then collected the $60 fee from all the kids. Once all the kids who were able to paid and I had a number of attending students, I faxed the ticket order to Disney. Faxes #1, 2, and 3 were not received. (That's roadblock #3 for those of you playing along at home). Finally, I was given another fax number and faxed the order form to a woman a DYG who was on the phone with me while I faxed it standing next to her fax machine. (I was adament that fax #4 would be a success!) Luckily, it went throught. I left for the day shortly thereafter and our business office manager had left the ticket confirmation in my box the next morning!
So, at that point, the kids had paid, buses were reserved, and the ticket order had been received! I was armed with a group number and confirmation number and was feelin' good!
That Friday, I sojourned to the local screenprinting place to hand in our t-shirt design. That was cutting it close with only a 10 day turn-around time, but the guy assured me he could do it. My fingers were crossed for 10 days.
Roadblock #4: Bacterial laryngitis. My fiance contracted this lovely illness the day of our selection meeting at Hurricane. I contracted it one week later, when I should have been mailing payment to Disney. I was home for three days, leaving my committee-mates to plan without me and contacting Disney by e-mail. Luckily, I had the check our office manager had cut and an address for Disney, so my fiance drove me to the post office to put the check in the mail.
Luckily, I returned to school on Thursday, May 1 to continue the planning. At that point, I found out that the county field trip permission slips I had left to be distributed to the 8th graders had somehow been given to some random kids and then disappeared entirely. So I had to copy 40 new permission slips, re-distribute them, and beg the kids to bring them in ASAP when they were supposedly due Friday, May 2 (this was when my plan was to hand them out on Monday, April 28!).
So with the check mailed and the permission slips coming in, I thought we were in the clear. Fast forward to this past Monday when the calls start coming. Apparently, some parents were refusing to allow their students (whom they had already paid the $60 fee for, mind you) to attend if they, the parents, couldn't come. Now, from the start, we had set a "No Parents" policy. Certain rules and regulations had been set down by the county, our admin, my committee, and me. I did not want to run into a situation where a parent gave her child permission to do something against our/Disney's rules and I/my admin would be held reliable. I pretty much got on the phone to these parents and tried to assure them that there would be adequate supervision by staff members and Disney employees. Some still said no, expecting me to allow them to go, and I didn't budge. I said, "Well, I'm sorry, but your child will have to miss the event. No, I cannot issue refunds and the tickets, buses, and t-shirts have already been purchased." This might be mean, but it was our policy. I dealt with about four parents, two of whom recanted when they found out how much supervision would be provided and two of whom still wouldn't let their daughters attend. So that was roadblock #5.
Midweek, I got a package from Disney with my 49 wristbands but only 39 meal tickets. I made a not to call DYG and remedy this later in the week. I also started packing a folder with our ticket confirmation, Official Chaperone Guide, chaperone lists, parking pass, wristbands, and meal tickets.
The rest of the week was generally smooth sailing aside from several kids whining that we didn't let them go. (Two were caught skipping school and two were caught drinking at school - obviously these kids are not going to Disney with us!) The shirts were ready by noon on May 8 and I picked them up that evening - so cute! I downloaded a Disney font and wrote our school name/mascot and "Grad Jam 2008". Then I found a graphic of "2008" with the zeros made to look like Mickey and had it put in our school colors. Adorable!
Roadblock #6, Friday morning: I got to school in my t-shirt and distributed shirts to excited 8th graders all day. The big fuss was the Disney no bag policy - I had so many kids and parents complaining to ME, when really, it was a DHS rule! I just kept saying no, even to the whiny mom complaning that her daughter NEEDED a bag for a tampon. I told her to put it in her pocket and get over it. Anyway, Friday morning I called DYG to tell them about my 10 missing meal tickets which I wanted to arrange to pick up at guest services. While on the phone with DYG, my homeroom student who checks my mailbox in the morning plunked the mail on my desk - in the pile was the envelop with payment that I had mailed to Disney weeks ago!. As The Phone Guy at DYG was telling me to see Beau at GS for my meal tickets, I said, "Uh, what happens if I just got my check for tickets returned to me?" Long story short, I had thought the wristbands were our tickets - NO! Actual park tickets would have been mailed if my check had been received, which it never was! Phone Guy told me to see Beau at GS, give him my check, and he would give me 49 tickets. This obviously had my stomach in knots all day because I did not want my 40 8th graders to arrive at Disney and then get turned away!
Okay, enough roadblocks, onto the trip....
Fast forward to 5pm: The bus showed up! That was our first triumph. Also, the kids all showed up in our courtyard dressed appropriately (yes!) with no bags (yes!) in good moods (double yes!). My four chaperone comrades and I got the kids on the bus, read them the rules, and headcounted (34... That's 40 minus the two who signed up and were kicked out, two who weren't allowed to go after paying, and two who got sick that day.)
At MGM, I left three chaperones with the bus to pass out the clear bags that the kids needed to put their belongings in for security and took Linda up to GS with me. Beau was wonderful and gave us the extra meal tickets and printed our 49 park tickets - problem solved! We met the kids outside the ticket window and distributed wristbands, tickets, and meal tickets. Then, we entered the park! After a group picture taken by a Photo Pass photographer, we met with our groups of 6-9 kids each and then set them loose! We agreed to let the kids do their thing with just hourly check ins. It's a small enough park that we knew we'd see them often enough.
This was 6:30pm. It was literally smooth sailing from there on out. The chaperones and I went on rides and ate together. Most of the students went to Fantasmic and so did we. All the kids were very good about checking in in person at the set times and calling their chaperone by cell phone whenever they moved about in the park (this was amazing - no one told them they had to do that - but we would just get texts saying "Sally, Jenny, Sarah, Beth, and Amy are going on Tower of Terror.")
The dance party started at 9pm and then the park really cleared out since it was closed to the general public. Our kids had a great time dancing and behaved very well on the dance floor. They also enjoyed the lack of wait time on the rides. They could literally jog through the lines, ride the ride, and then get right back on!
My chaperones enjoyed the free entrance (1 chaperone per each 10 kids, and we upcharged a bit to pay for extra chaperones) and the free meal. (We ate together at ABC Commisary - not great, but it was air conditioned and filled us up!) We also enjoyed the chaperone lounge inside Hollywood & Vine. It had AC and complimentary water, coffee, and tea - I particularly enjoyed the caffeine-free energy blend tea! (I keep mentioning AC - if anyone was at Disney this past Friday they know: I don't think it got below 90 degrees even at 1am!)
Disney provided excellent supervision and security throughout the park, which gave us peace of mind. There were cast members and security officers literally everywhere.
All in all, we had a wonderful time. DYG Services made everything very easy for me. All night, we kept running into kids who were supremely ill-behaved (making out, jumping lines, talking on rides and in shows, etc.) and never witnessed any of that behavior from our kids. Disney did not have to page us once regarding our students' behavior. We kept commenting on how proud we were of our kids - they really acted responsibly and had a great time without breaking any rules. The only issue was a few girls hanging out with boys from other schools, which we swiftly corrected. (Girls will be girls!)
At the end of the night, we met the kids in at the corner near the Beauty & the Beast Theater at 1am when the park closed. We got them all out, onto the bus, and back to school. We were waiting for late parents until after 2am (not fun) and I got home around 3am. A late night that left me tired and sore all day Saturday, but worth it!
If you're a middle school teacher or administrator in the Central Florida area, I highly suggest this event. Disney provided a safe and fun environment, and it was an awesome celebration for our graduating 8th graders. The tickets are reasonably priced and include the rides, dance party, and a free meal. It really is a great time. A lot of my coworkers thought I was crazy to take that many 8th graders to Disney and turn them loose, but it's such a well planed event on Disney's side that with an organized field trip leader, the planning can really be a breeze for the chaperones, the administrators, and the families.
If you are planning a family trip to Disney during the Grad Jam, I can safely tell you not to worry. Although they opened the park to 8th grade groups at 6pm, I didn't feel like they were taking over the place. The park closed at 9pm with a Fantasmic show, so families were not having to leave earlier than usual. I know that the high school Grad Night has cause problems with some Disney vacations, but I can safely say that Grad Jam is a smaller event that shouldn't impact vacation planning as much.
How it all started....
My roommate/our guidance counselor e-mailed me in early April saying that she'd gotten an advertisement from Disney about some 8th grade event and did I want to take the 8th graders? I told her to bring the stuff down to my room. Apparently, Disney Grad Night is like a right of passage for graduating high school seniors in the Central Florida 8th graders that my roommate and a lot of our other staff members remember going to. After reading the information from Disney and poking around on the internet, I learned that Grad Jam is the little sister of Grad Night - a scaled-down graduation celebration specifically for 8th graders. This year, it was held at Hollywood Studios from 6pm-1am. The event features rides (obviously), food, and a DJ dance party under the Sorcerer's Hat. After reading about the event, I decided to bite the bullet and formed a committee to plan the event.
The extended, awful, problem-plagued planning process....
The first step was to find transportation. My planning committee comrade, Karen, called our approved charter bus provider and found out that all the charter buses in the area were completely booked for the event! We pretty much thought we were done at that point until Karen decided to call our county transportation office and ask about other approved charter bus services. The woman on the phone at transportation services magically announced that she would let us have a school bus! We couldn't believe this because usually we can only use the buses for field trip between 9am and 1pm - we couldn't believe we could have a bus out until 2am! So that was the first roadblock that we managed to navigate.
Roadblock #2: Reading the paperwork, I discovered that we were supposed to have purchased our tickets over a month ago, despite receiving the materials only two weeks before. We got on the phone to Disney Youth Groups and luckily spoke to a woman whose brother was a student at our school (DYG is in Celebration, FL, only about 10 miles down the road.) She reserved us a place without any form of paperwork or payment, bless her heart. We just had to promise to get everything in ASAP. (Paperwork reserving tickets and payment, essentially.)
Then it was time to tell the students. Of course, they freaked out. Being from the area, many have CMs in the family, but none get to have the park closed just for themselves and their friends until 1am. We held an 8th grade assembly to inform them of the event and hand out information.
Next came the selection process, a very official meeting held over beers and blue cheese dip at Hurricane Grill and Wings on Sand Lake Road. The interested 8th graders had to submit a paragraph to me detailing how they planned to act maturely and responsibly at the event. The selection process pretty much consisted of us giggling at the cute things they wrote in their paragraphs and deciding everyone could go as long as they didn't get in any hot water at school between then an May 9.
The next Monday, I posted the list of accepted students, which of course caused a general uproar. We then collected the $60 fee from all the kids. Once all the kids who were able to paid and I had a number of attending students, I faxed the ticket order to Disney. Faxes #1, 2, and 3 were not received. (That's roadblock #3 for those of you playing along at home). Finally, I was given another fax number and faxed the order form to a woman a DYG who was on the phone with me while I faxed it standing next to her fax machine. (I was adament that fax #4 would be a success!) Luckily, it went throught. I left for the day shortly thereafter and our business office manager had left the ticket confirmation in my box the next morning!
So, at that point, the kids had paid, buses were reserved, and the ticket order had been received! I was armed with a group number and confirmation number and was feelin' good!
That Friday, I sojourned to the local screenprinting place to hand in our t-shirt design. That was cutting it close with only a 10 day turn-around time, but the guy assured me he could do it. My fingers were crossed for 10 days.
Roadblock #4: Bacterial laryngitis. My fiance contracted this lovely illness the day of our selection meeting at Hurricane. I contracted it one week later, when I should have been mailing payment to Disney. I was home for three days, leaving my committee-mates to plan without me and contacting Disney by e-mail. Luckily, I had the check our office manager had cut and an address for Disney, so my fiance drove me to the post office to put the check in the mail.
Luckily, I returned to school on Thursday, May 1 to continue the planning. At that point, I found out that the county field trip permission slips I had left to be distributed to the 8th graders had somehow been given to some random kids and then disappeared entirely. So I had to copy 40 new permission slips, re-distribute them, and beg the kids to bring them in ASAP when they were supposedly due Friday, May 2 (this was when my plan was to hand them out on Monday, April 28!).
So with the check mailed and the permission slips coming in, I thought we were in the clear. Fast forward to this past Monday when the calls start coming. Apparently, some parents were refusing to allow their students (whom they had already paid the $60 fee for, mind you) to attend if they, the parents, couldn't come. Now, from the start, we had set a "No Parents" policy. Certain rules and regulations had been set down by the county, our admin, my committee, and me. I did not want to run into a situation where a parent gave her child permission to do something against our/Disney's rules and I/my admin would be held reliable. I pretty much got on the phone to these parents and tried to assure them that there would be adequate supervision by staff members and Disney employees. Some still said no, expecting me to allow them to go, and I didn't budge. I said, "Well, I'm sorry, but your child will have to miss the event. No, I cannot issue refunds and the tickets, buses, and t-shirts have already been purchased." This might be mean, but it was our policy. I dealt with about four parents, two of whom recanted when they found out how much supervision would be provided and two of whom still wouldn't let their daughters attend. So that was roadblock #5.
Midweek, I got a package from Disney with my 49 wristbands but only 39 meal tickets. I made a not to call DYG and remedy this later in the week. I also started packing a folder with our ticket confirmation, Official Chaperone Guide, chaperone lists, parking pass, wristbands, and meal tickets.
The rest of the week was generally smooth sailing aside from several kids whining that we didn't let them go. (Two were caught skipping school and two were caught drinking at school - obviously these kids are not going to Disney with us!) The shirts were ready by noon on May 8 and I picked them up that evening - so cute! I downloaded a Disney font and wrote our school name/mascot and "Grad Jam 2008". Then I found a graphic of "2008" with the zeros made to look like Mickey and had it put in our school colors. Adorable!
Roadblock #6, Friday morning: I got to school in my t-shirt and distributed shirts to excited 8th graders all day. The big fuss was the Disney no bag policy - I had so many kids and parents complaining to ME, when really, it was a DHS rule! I just kept saying no, even to the whiny mom complaning that her daughter NEEDED a bag for a tampon. I told her to put it in her pocket and get over it. Anyway, Friday morning I called DYG to tell them about my 10 missing meal tickets which I wanted to arrange to pick up at guest services. While on the phone with DYG, my homeroom student who checks my mailbox in the morning plunked the mail on my desk - in the pile was the envelop with payment that I had mailed to Disney weeks ago!. As The Phone Guy at DYG was telling me to see Beau at GS for my meal tickets, I said, "Uh, what happens if I just got my check for tickets returned to me?" Long story short, I had thought the wristbands were our tickets - NO! Actual park tickets would have been mailed if my check had been received, which it never was! Phone Guy told me to see Beau at GS, give him my check, and he would give me 49 tickets. This obviously had my stomach in knots all day because I did not want my 40 8th graders to arrive at Disney and then get turned away!
Okay, enough roadblocks, onto the trip....
Fast forward to 5pm: The bus showed up! That was our first triumph. Also, the kids all showed up in our courtyard dressed appropriately (yes!) with no bags (yes!) in good moods (double yes!). My four chaperone comrades and I got the kids on the bus, read them the rules, and headcounted (34... That's 40 minus the two who signed up and were kicked out, two who weren't allowed to go after paying, and two who got sick that day.)
At MGM, I left three chaperones with the bus to pass out the clear bags that the kids needed to put their belongings in for security and took Linda up to GS with me. Beau was wonderful and gave us the extra meal tickets and printed our 49 park tickets - problem solved! We met the kids outside the ticket window and distributed wristbands, tickets, and meal tickets. Then, we entered the park! After a group picture taken by a Photo Pass photographer, we met with our groups of 6-9 kids each and then set them loose! We agreed to let the kids do their thing with just hourly check ins. It's a small enough park that we knew we'd see them often enough.
This was 6:30pm. It was literally smooth sailing from there on out. The chaperones and I went on rides and ate together. Most of the students went to Fantasmic and so did we. All the kids were very good about checking in in person at the set times and calling their chaperone by cell phone whenever they moved about in the park (this was amazing - no one told them they had to do that - but we would just get texts saying "Sally, Jenny, Sarah, Beth, and Amy are going on Tower of Terror.")
The dance party started at 9pm and then the park really cleared out since it was closed to the general public. Our kids had a great time dancing and behaved very well on the dance floor. They also enjoyed the lack of wait time on the rides. They could literally jog through the lines, ride the ride, and then get right back on!
My chaperones enjoyed the free entrance (1 chaperone per each 10 kids, and we upcharged a bit to pay for extra chaperones) and the free meal. (We ate together at ABC Commisary - not great, but it was air conditioned and filled us up!) We also enjoyed the chaperone lounge inside Hollywood & Vine. It had AC and complimentary water, coffee, and tea - I particularly enjoyed the caffeine-free energy blend tea! (I keep mentioning AC - if anyone was at Disney this past Friday they know: I don't think it got below 90 degrees even at 1am!)
Disney provided excellent supervision and security throughout the park, which gave us peace of mind. There were cast members and security officers literally everywhere.
All in all, we had a wonderful time. DYG Services made everything very easy for me. All night, we kept running into kids who were supremely ill-behaved (making out, jumping lines, talking on rides and in shows, etc.) and never witnessed any of that behavior from our kids. Disney did not have to page us once regarding our students' behavior. We kept commenting on how proud we were of our kids - they really acted responsibly and had a great time without breaking any rules. The only issue was a few girls hanging out with boys from other schools, which we swiftly corrected. (Girls will be girls!)
At the end of the night, we met the kids in at the corner near the Beauty & the Beast Theater at 1am when the park closed. We got them all out, onto the bus, and back to school. We were waiting for late parents until after 2am (not fun) and I got home around 3am. A late night that left me tired and sore all day Saturday, but worth it!
If you're a middle school teacher or administrator in the Central Florida area, I highly suggest this event. Disney provided a safe and fun environment, and it was an awesome celebration for our graduating 8th graders. The tickets are reasonably priced and include the rides, dance party, and a free meal. It really is a great time. A lot of my coworkers thought I was crazy to take that many 8th graders to Disney and turn them loose, but it's such a well planed event on Disney's side that with an organized field trip leader, the planning can really be a breeze for the chaperones, the administrators, and the families.
If you are planning a family trip to Disney during the Grad Jam, I can safely tell you not to worry. Although they opened the park to 8th grade groups at 6pm, I didn't feel like they were taking over the place. The park closed at 9pm with a Fantasmic show, so families were not having to leave earlier than usual. I know that the high school Grad Night has cause problems with some Disney vacations, but I can safely say that Grad Jam is a smaller event that shouldn't impact vacation planning as much.
