So many vacations, so little time/money. WWYD?

[tvguy]

I am a teacher and I would say take the 1st grader out of school for a week. I took my daughter (and myself) out for at least a week every year until she got to high school.

This is the most controversial topic on the DIS boards, and everyone has to make their own decision. Just make sure you make an informed decision.
Around here that is Truancy, and that is a felony. So investigate what the situation is in your state, county and school district so you don't have any surprises.
In the district I live in, we have open enrollment and an unexcused absence like that can cause your child to lose their slot in your selected school. For a while parents were putting their children in Independent Study temporarily to get around that, but now too causes your child to forfeit their slot in their school.

 

[auntlynne]

Sounds like you have come up with a great solution on some many fronts: still cruise DCL on the Fantasy E Carib (keeping your plans ). Trying another cruise line (I think it’s a great idea, just for perspective - remembering it is comparing varieties of apples and not every Fuji lover enjoys a Granny Smith). Saving money. And vacationing with the family. Done with conversation with in-laws. And possible airfare and cruise savings.

This is shaping up nicely. Hope it’s all a great time. And two cruises in 2024! Woot woot.

(Watch the price in your Royal cruise and activities. If the price goes down, get a price adjustment. They often have Black Friday sales on drinks, WiFi packages, etc…)

 

[we"reofftoneverland]

This is the most controversial topic on the DIS boards, and everyone has to make their own decision. Just make sure you make an informed decision.
Around here that is Truancy, and that is a felony. So investigate what the situation is in your state, county and school district so you don't have any surprises.
In the district I live in, we have open enrollment and an unexcused absence like that can cause your child to lose their slot in your selected school. For a while parents were putting their children in Independent Study temporarily to get around that, but now too causes your child to forfeit their slot in their school.

Good grief

 

[Cheburashka]

Yeah, all my estimates include use of the placeholder. It's nice, but unfortunately it's not $1600-$1800 worth of nice

Your placeholder discount won't apply for cruises that sail over major holidays like Thanksgiving, etc. Be careful to look at blackout dates when making price comparisons- for those expensive cruises especially, it makes a real difference to not get the discount. If you move the reservation to a blackout date, you permanently lose the discount, even if you subsequently move it to a non-blackout date, so be careful.

I'm with the "Sail with you in 2025" camp. I respect their decision not to pull their child from school (because this is a travel board, a lot of posters here will pooh-pooh that decision as you've seen, but there can be plenty of situations in which it's better to not pull even a young child from school). However, you should never let yourself feel pressured to pay extra to travel with them around their schedule.

 

[Princesca]

Good grief

No kidding. So ridiculous. I could not care less about perfect attendance for my kid. We intend to send him to private school for a variety of reasons, and I have already asked them if a week-long absence would be okay. No issues as long as he does some homework while away.

Also it isn't an issue for my inlaws. She said the doesn't mind her missing a day or two during a holiday week. So this is obviously a preference issue for them and not a felony offense.

 

[Princesca]

Your placeholder discount won't apply for cruises that sail over major holidays like Thanksgiving, etc. Be careful to look at blackout dates when making price comparisons- for those expensive cruises especially, it makes a real difference to not get the discount. If you move the reservation to a blackout date, you permanently lose the discount, even if you subsequently move it to a non-blackout date, so be careful.

I'm with the "Sail with you in 2025" camp. I respect their decision not to pull their child from school (because this is a travel board, a lot of posters here will pooh-pooh that decision as you've seen, but there can be plenty of situations in which it's better to not pull even a young child from school). However, you should never let yourself feel pressured to pay extra to travel with them around their schedule.

Thanks for this reminder! I knew this but had completely forgotten.

 

[tvguy]

No kidding. So ridiculous. I could not care less about perfect attendance for my kid. We intend to send him to private school for a variety of reasons, and I have already asked them if a week-long absence would be okay. No issues as long as he does some homework while away.

Also it isn't an issue for my inlaws. She said the doesn't mind her missing a day or two during a holiday week. So this is obviously a preference issue for them and not a felony offense.

My kids went to private school. It used to be a popular option for parents who wanted to take their kids out of school for vacation. Their high school used to allow such absences. No more. The organization that accredits private schools decided this will no longer be allowed. Which is my point. You need to check what your options are with your school.

 

[MomOTwins]

Yeah, they haven't really pressured us to drop ours. We looked at seeing if it would be a possibility to change ours, but the cost difference for those dates versus our April date is pretty staggering. My wife was arguing we should just bump ours up and go in March when they can go, but the cost is like $1600 more and I told her that didn't make much sense when I'm pricing cruises on RC that we could do at $1000 per person. That's almost half a whole second cruise. And for all I know airfare would cost more as well, so there's added expense there too. If we cruise on RC out of NJ, which is what I'm looking at, we would drive to their house about 8 hours, or actually probably fly (it's a shuttle route, as opposed to flying to FL), which we do at least once a year anyway, then shuttle together 3 more hours to the port together.

Do the inlaws want to do RCCL though or just DCL?

 

[Princesca]

Do the inlaws want to do RCCL though or just DCL?

My FIL seems to have his heart set on DCL which I hate to discourage. But he also has his heart set on a holiday trip, and I just flat out told then we can't afford a holiday cruise with Disney. Even if we could make it work I just don't think I want to spend that much on one cruise, esp to Caribbean ports of call.

 

[Nicnicnic.nic]

I am a teacher and I would say take the 1st grader out of school for a week. I took my daughter (and myself) out for at least a week every year until she got to high school. As a teacher and single parent, I can't often afford to travel during school breaks. Even though my daughter will be in 11th grade this year, I will be taking her out for 4 days for our Northern Europe and Norwegian Fjords Cruise (we only have to miss 4 days because it is over labor day week). Travel (at least for us) is very educational and not something that can be done in the classroom. I think all of her travels and experiences have made her a better student and person in general. She got all A's and only one B as a sophomore last year in all Honors IB classes so I don't think her missing school sometimes for travel has hurt her in any way.

How do you approach the school about asking permission to take a vacation? Do you just ask the teacher?

My daughter is in preschool now so no problem but she'll be in public kindergarten in a year and I've been thinking about this.

 

[lanejudy]

How do you approach the school about asking permission to take a vacation? Do you just ask the teacher?

My daughter is in preschool now so no problem but she'll be in public kindergarten in a year and I've been thinking about this.

Attendance policies should be spelled out in the handbook, which should be distributed (maybe electronic) each fall. In our district the family must sign acknowledging receipt.

 

[MomOTwins]

My FIL seems to have his heart set on DCL which I hate to discourage. But he also has his heart set on a holiday trip, and I just flat out told then we can't afford a holiday cruise with Disney. Even if we could make it work I just don't think I want to spend that much on one cruise, esp to Caribbean ports of call.

That does make it more complicated—since your family likes both DCL and RCCL but your FIL only wants DCL, seems like it would make sense to find a way to compromise on a lower cost DCL option. For example, the 5 nights out of Miami/FLL are a LOT cheaper than the cruises out of Port Canaveral. Or you could look into if there is a cheaper room category on the Fantasy. And if all that fails I’d suggest trying to look for another type of year when fares might be cheaper but there would still be time off for your inlaws—e.g does their school do a fall break?

I remember one time my dad pushed us all to go on an all inclusive cancun resort location and I went even though I didn’t think that was a vacation we’d enjoy. It was a total disaster. Vacation funds and time off are too limited to spend wishing you were on a different vacation.

 

[tlprice]

How do you approach the school about asking permission to take a vacation? Do you just ask the teacher?

My daughter is in preschool now so no problem but she'll be in public kindergarten in a year and I've been thinking about this.

I usually just ask the teachers or teacher if they think it will be a problem for her to be out. We also have a form at the school that the parent can fill out that the teacher/teachers sign. I only get annoyed when parents take their kid out for a vacation when that kid is failing their classes. I don't think that should be allowed. If my daughter was doing bad in school I definitely wouldn't take her out. She also pretty much never misses school for anything. She missed 2 days this year for being sick which was the first time in at least 4 years.

I do know some school/districts have very strict policies, but ours doesn't which can be good and bad.