Missing time from high school

[CharlesTD]

Sorry, you read my post too soon as I didn't mean to put in the paying salary comment as it didn't sound right. I will agree with you on one thing though, family vacations are very important (and it sounds like in your case they are even more so as shift work takes its toll on many busy families), but just as your family vacation is very important, so is my family vacation time with my child and husband, but my job doesn't allow me to take any vacation time during the year because I need to be available to teach your child and the best way for me to do this is to be available on a consistent basis and be totally committed to my vocation as teacher. The only way for this to happen is for me to be there during the school year. We as teachers ask that parents respect this as it makes us feel that our roles as teachers aren't to be totally committed to our students seeing as how we are there on a valued because believe me, most teachers (especially those of us who go to Disney World often) would love to be able to take family vacations during the year instead of at peak times, but we can't and that is fine as it allows for usconsistent basis. I know of teachers who can't take any family vacation time at all because their spouses jobs only dictate vacations throughout the year. I bet parents would be up in arms (as they should be if this happened) if school boards allowed us to take vacations during the year. Just a different persective for you to think about.

Hope all goes well for your child in school this year, Tiger

Thanks for the well wishes on the schooling she is actually pulling a B plus average so far so not to bad. I actually worked at a job that only allowed certain times of year for vacation and it was not during the summer it was during Oct Nov Dec as those were our slowest months. So I know exactly what you mean about that. Now I am lucky and I can pretty much go when I want some minor acceptions but nothing serious.

 

[East Coaster]

I have a 13 yo DD and a 16 yo DS, we took them out of school last year missing 12 school days for vacation and although the oldest said it wasn't easy catching up it did not affect their final marks at the end of the year. My DS had better marks that semester than the previous one! My daughter does not struggle at all at school so it wasn't an issue for her.

When asked if we'd do it again....Yes! We are heading to Disney the 28th of April and the children will miss 10 days this time. Are they apprehensive............No! Can't wait to get there. The oldest said his marks improved last year because he felt he had to give more effort than if he hadn't missed school. This year he is in grade 11 and we have always promoted strong study habits, and he realizes he needs to make the effort for good grades for University, therefore his marks are way ahead of last year already.

Why do we do this? In the past two years I have reentered the work force, when can I get two weeks off in a row, between November and May and definitely not at Christmas or March Break. Last year was our FIRST family trip anywhere, it was the first time we could afford to go anywhere beause I chose to stay home with the children when they were younger and finances dictate. It was the best time I've had in my life and also for the children, we feel that there were so many things we did not see or do that we want to go as a family one last time. The memories made on that trip were over the top for us!

Everyone has their reasons for doing the things they do, my only regret is that I couldn't have taken my children on vacations like this when they were younger!

 

[Mortlives]

Now that DS is in High School, and finding it far more challenging than previous years, we wouldn't take him out for 2 weeks. We are taking him out for the 2 days prior to March break, but he will only miss one of each class, and he will hand in his homework for each of those classes on our way out of the country. Unfortunately, that's the only way we can make our Spring break trip (Disney Cruise, driving down). Yes, school is important, but so is travel (I learned so much travelling with my parents as a child) and the bonding that comes from family vacations. We have so few years where he'll want to travel with us (less than many, he's only lived with us since 2002), so we have to make this count as much as possible.

If I recall, from previous years, the day before March break is the "busiest travel day of the year" so I can only assume that the average teacher isn't going to be having major exams that day. Anyway, I understand how a teacher might not want students to be vacationing extensively on school time, but I think the individual student's abilities need to be taken into account as well.

 

[ottawa-newbie]

<putting on my flame suit here>

I think I'm one of the minority here , but if or when I have kids I hope that schools go all year round, like they do in other countries. After all, the kids nowadays don't have to be home in the summer to work in the fields anymore.
Having staggered holidays throughout the year sure would put a lot less stress on the travel industry in general...

DH and I specifically book our vacations during off-peak times, and I'm probably one of a handful of people who actually dislikes vacationing during the dog days of summer. (Give me an air-conditioned office any day)

Just my two cents

 

[Scratch42]

<putting on my flame suit here>

I think I'm one of the minority here , but if or when I have kids I hope that schools go all year round, like they do in other countries. After all, the kids nowadays don't have to be home in the summer to work in the fields anymore.
Having staggered holidays throughout the year sure would put a lot less stress on the travel industry in general...

DH and I specifically book our vacations during off-peak times, and I'm probably one of a handful of people who actually dislikes vacationing during the dog days of summer. (Give me an air-conditioned office any day)

Just my two cents

Not a bad idea for year round school! Maybe that would also alleviate the problems that we seem to be having in Toronto! Give the kids less time for shooting!



janet

 

[marylou]

I think Year round school would be great!

 

[laura001]

We have done this a few times and it has been fine. We do check with the Principal first and we let each teacher know that the principal has Ok'd it and that this is the only time our family was able to go (not that I really believe it is their business), but you don't need to try to rub anyone the wrong way. I just ask if the teacher would be able to get something ready for them and that we will pick it up the day before we leave. If your child is having some difficulty, you can always arrange a tutor for the first couple of nights that you are back to help them catch up.

I have only had a problem once with one teacher, he said that he disagrees with taking a vacation while school is in and found that if he prepared work, most of the time the kids didn't do it. I explained that unfortunatley this was the time that we were able to vacation and that I thought it was quite rude for the students not to do the work when they had asked for it, but please not to let my son be the one that suffers because of what someone else had done. Anyway, I kissed his butt a little because that was what he needed and off we went, my son did his work and it was fine.

 

[pxlbarrel]

I don't have kids but when I was a kid my parents would never have pulled us out of school for a vacation. NEVER. And we didn't even have provincial testing when I was in school.

We did our vacations in the summer instead...sure..peak travel times but to them, our education was more important. We had a summer trip every year until I was in first year university (then we were expected to pay our own way. LOL) Geez, we're still taking them together now! (well...only when I drag them to WDW...willing victims of my madness)

I think I'm in the minority here when I think it's not a good thing to pull your kids out of high school for a trip to WDW. It might have been ok for elementary school but in high school, the whole dynamic is different. If your child isn't in high school yet, I'd say it's too early to say that he or she can cope with missing two weeks of school. I'd wait until they were in Grade 9 before deciding whether or not it's a good idea.

If they had pulled us I think that I would have been worried about trying to do work to catch up or do the homework we were given instead of enjoying myself at WDW. I loved summer vacations....I didn't have to worry about taking an exam when I got back, or doing homework in between visits to Magic Kingdom. It was a carefree vacation with no worries.

High school is a whole different beast then elementary school.

 

[mbb]

<putting on my flame suit here>

I think I'm one of the minority here , but if or when I have kids I hope that schools go all year round, like they do in other countries. After all, the kids nowadays don't have to be home in the summer to work in the fields anymore.
Having staggered holidays throughout the year sure would put a lot less stress on the travel industry in general...

DH and I specifically book our vacations during off-peak times, and I'm probably one of a handful of people who actually dislikes vacationing during the dog days of summer. (Give me an air-conditioned office any day)

Just my two cents

No flames here

JMHO, an honest discussion of how school as an institution serves children is long overdue....and part of that discussion has to be about how this service is delivered.

We take our kids out now, easily - they're in grade 2.. and we'll continue to do so...but it "gets my dander up" when I'm told by a teacher that they won't have for a few more years: "You won't be taking them out of my class for that long when I have them"...

And that just makes me sad....so like someone else posted, we'll decide what's best for everyone in our family..we may have to pay a little more, work a little harder before we go, and encourage our School Board Representative to open dialogue at the regional level about bringing about more effective ways to "teach outcomes".

Sorry about the run-on sentence!

 

[Tiger926]

It confuses a lot of us teachers why parents get their backs up when we express displeasure at taking their children out of school for vacation and make comments like: "We'll decide what's best for our family." Unfortunately, this is a bit problematic since you send your kids to our schools to be educated by us. I can understand if teachers were telling parents what to serve for breakfast or what kinds of clothes to put their children in, but taking children out of school is something that may or may not directly affect their academic life and that is a risk I'm not sure parents really should be taking.

I do understand that they are your children, but when they are in school they become our responsibility to educate. You may know what's best in regards to family dynamics, work schedules, etc. but when they are in our classes then we are the experts in regards to their academic life. The disconnect between parents and the education system is getting wider because of this kind of stuff. Now granted some kids do just fine being pulled out of school for vacation, and I will admit that some teachers don't know their students as well as they should, but for the most part, we are seeing kids being pulled in every direction as parents insist upon things that have negative affects on their children.

This relates to this vacation thread as some parents think their kids can handle being out of school that long, but as teachers we know otherwise. Or, some students really don't want to miss school or do work while on vacation, but their parents have other ideas. More specifically, I am a high school department head, so obviously I know a thing or two about education, but when I drop my DD2.5 off to her Montessori school, they are the experts and not me. I don't ever question what they tell me because they are the experts here and me being a teacher has no bearing on them doing their job - it just makes it easier to talk to them, but I don't ever doubt their professional judgments or assessments at all - that is what I am paying them for. Our school policy is that no tuition will be reimbursed for kids taken out of school - if parents feel the need to take kids out, they do so at their own risk and with financial penalty, plain and simple.

I know this is going to irritate some parents, but it's a big problem as of late, and it's getting even bigger as more and more kids are dropping out of school because: 1) their parents didn't want them to fail a grade and 2) their parents have insisted that they be placed in academic levels that are way beyond their scope of understanding. Please don't think that I'm trying to incite a debate about us trying to tell each other how to do our jobs, but as teachers we are getting very frustrated with parents not recognizing the importance of our jobs and accepting our professional judgments. Parents taking kids out of school without any regard for the professional opinions or assessments of the people who have been hired to educate their children is something that just adds to the ever widening gap between parents and teachers, IMHO.

Tiger

 

[UrsulasShadow]

I agree with you, Tiger, and it seems to me that the people who take their children out of schools for vacations are the very first ones to criticise the teachers for "not doing their jobs" when their children struggle.

Time spent with one's own children is very important, I agree, but to disrupt a child's education for the convenience of the parent is NOT in the child's best interest, no matter how much fun you all will have on vacation.