Did your kids get ripped off for school field trips compared to yourself?

[inanna]

My daughter and I discussed this the other day while out on an day excursion that took us up to Lake Erie and Port Stanley.

When I was young and attended the public schools here in south western Ontario, the teachers took us out of the class room. A lot.

There were short little trips to places like the grocery store (we got to go in to the back part where all the stock was kept and where the butcher worked). We got to see various local farms and how they worked. We went to various parks, museums and conservation centres.

Around grade three we did a short (3 day) sleep away camp trip at a site not far away from my hometown. The cost? Nothing.

One of my greatest school trips happened when I was in grade five after we'd relocated to Alberta for a few years. We went for six days to the YMCA Camp Yamnuska Centre in the Calgary foothills. We slept in bunkhouse cabins, made ice cream the old fashioned way, did a lot of hiking on trails, some survival training (learned to make tea out of pine needles). Every night we ate in the lodge style dining room and had a sing along around the lodge fireplace.

That trip cost my father about $50.00 total - for an entire week away and a lifetime of memories.

Back in Ontario (for eighth grade graduation), we went to Toronto for THREE DAYS. A school bus took us there (along with a few parents as chaperones). We stayed at York University campus. We visited the Royal Ontario Museum, The Ontario Science Centre, caught a Blue Jays game - and went to Ontario Place and Wonderland Amusement park. Again, the cost to my parents was only about $50.00.

And because the trip cost less than the school had anticipated, on the second day in Toronto our principal decided to splurge and took us all to Pizza Hut - something most of us had never had at that point.

Even in high school I had a few: a memorable one was a trip to the Henry Ford house in Detroit.

My daughter and I were contrasting all of that with her own experience in school - and it was very limited compared to mine: she went on a few trips to grocery stores, maybe a farm, maybe a museum. She had a decent eighth grade trip as well, but overall, had far less out of class room experiences than I (or her father)did.

I always considered the field trips the best part of my school experience - not to mention the lasting memories. My daughter said, "Yeah, we got totally ripped off that way."

Just to add - the vast majority of those trip required no money at all - only a packed lunch and signed parental consent form!

[MineralMan]

1. Yes. These days, there is a charge for everything.

I remember countless field trips in school. I graduated from High School in 1963. Overnight band trips. No charge for the rooms. The school paid for them. Trips to every nearby museum and educational attraction. We rode the school bus and never paid anything for anything, except food.

It seemed like we were always getting on a bus and going somewhere. It all came out of the school budget.

These days, there's a fee for being in the band, for being on a sports team, and for everything you do away from the school grounds. The kids have to have fundraisers to participate in activities. Those costs aren't in the budget anymore. Can't pay? Then you can't participate.

We also got free driver's training and much, much more. All out of the school budget. Nobody complained about it. Nobody suggested that such stuff be paid for by parents. It was all part of going to school.

[inanna]

2. Yes. It seemed like every few weeks we were going somewhere.

And I remember asking my daughter (when she was young and in grade school):

"How come you guys never get to go anywhere?"

The other big difference was, of course, when she did go anywhere (even to a local spot) we always had to pay. The school paid for nothing.

[teach1st]

3. There are additional costs for field trips

Due to security concerns, our district charges each field trip chaperone $50 for an extensive background check. District buses are no longer provided free to us. Parks have started charging for admission. I used to be able to take my class to the beach each year for free and an entire grade level to our state capitol for a two-day field trip for less than $100 per student (food and lodging included). It's getting more and more difficult to engineer affordable and memorable field trips.

[inanna]

4. Thanks. That's kind of what I was thinking...

Security concerns, etc.

Good to hear a teacher chime in on this.

Still, it's kind of sad. The kids are missing out on life-enriching experiences. Big time!

[teach1st]

6. I agree

A good field trip is worth weeks of classroom instruction.

[Kirk Lover]

5. In the 70's and 80's when I went to school I remember the permission slip and the moola...

there was always moola involved in said trips. My out of school excursions were much less numerous than yours.

[inanna]

7. Awww :)

Yeah, you and I attended school around the same time.

Odd that your experience was so different from mine.

We had a blast! Especially the camping trips.

[fierywoman]

8. I'm watching kids up here in the Pac NW paying a few thousand dollars

to "Play at Carnegie Hall".
What no one seems to understand is: ANYONE can play at Carnegie Hall if they can pay the fee to rent it for the venue. AND, it's rarely the big hall (Carnegie) they're actually performing in -- it's the recital hall attached to Carnegie.
Sad.

[inanna]

9. A few thousand dollars!

Yeah. That is ridiculous!

[fierywoman]

10. Yup: flight, hotel in Manhatten and fee for the hall.

There's another trip they do where they go to Disney (CA) and "record" Disney music in the recording studio there. Not that anyone ever hears the result!

[Codeine]

11. My kids do pretty well.

They get a couple live theater trips each year, usually one or two movies, and at least one “hands on” learning experience, like a pottery place or a dairy farm or similar. They also do a lot of walking trips to nearby landmarks like the Mission Inn or a museum. My daughter went to science camp for a week free of charge two years ago, and she’s going to a drama workshop for several days next year, also free.

The only really good trip I remember as a kid was a visit to some petroglyphs outside our town in Wyoming, which was mostly memorable because my friends and I found a ton of fish fossils in a slate field nearby.

[inanna]

13. Good to hear that some (at least) get to experience the fun.

In general, I think the kids today have far less of these experiences than I did.

But geez, some of what you mention with your kids sounds better than the trips I had!

That's awesome. They will definitely remember it!

[Codeine]

20. Our elementary school is amazing.

It’s a poor neighborhood (the school gives free lunch and breakfast to everyone, no questions asked, because it’s just assumed that nearly everyone will need the subsidy) but they are really rigorous and forward looking. They developed their own curriculum which exceeds all state standards, even after the state imposed tougher standards a few years back.

The local middle school (I hate that term, it’s fucking junior high, people) absolutely sucks ass, so we transferred our eldest to the local performing arts charter school, which is a far better environment. She went from being bullied for being gay to being in a place where seemingly half the students are openly queer. The only downsides are that they don’t have a lunch program (they’re spread out over several blocks in a downtown area, and the kids eat at a few restaurants or bring a lunch) and there is no phys-ed.

[FarCenter]

12. IIRC, one field trip per year in elementary school, none in high school.

[kimbutgar]

14. I went to catholic schools so very few field trips

But in the summer I went to public summer school and we went on field trips at least twice a week. I learned so much on those field trips and I also met different kids then the ones I knew at catholic school.

That said I have gone on field trips as a substitute teacher many times. It just depends on the districts. I doubt kids in Arizona, West Virginia, Oklahoma and Kansas ever go on field trips.

[JDC]

15. My kids have been really lucky. Great field trips.

They also offer the higher end New York or DC trips. Which, given the scope and of the trips, were aost always worth ot to my wife and I.

[treestar]

16. Yes.

I think they got afraid of liability, losing a child and the like. Or a kidnapping or something.

We went to Hershey Park in 4th grade! Saw the chocolate factory and then got to go on rides. 5th grade went to Gettysburg, a three hour drive or so. Valley Forge was one and Washington D.C. I think 8th grade. We went to a bread making factory and a few local museums and the zoo. Even movies, if they were deemed literary or historical - one was Romeo and Juliet, I recall.

[Mr.Bill]

17. I went to school in the 60s.

I don't remember ever paying for a field trip. We never did any overnight ones, though. The only camp I ever went to was a Boy Scout summer camp for a week. The troop paid for it, but we earned the money ourselves, mainly by collecting old newspapers.

Lots of things cost a lot of money today that didn't cost much years ago. I volunteer at a local hospital and before I could do that they paid $1,400 dollars for a federal background investigation on me the same as they do for any employee. Also they pay for my flu shot and an annual TB test.

[RockCreek]

18. There is also an industry of expensive package trips.

Eighth grade trips to Washington DC are one of them. Airplanes to get there, not buses. Very choreographed, etc. And expensive, at least in some places without clear or real financial assistance to those students/families in a school unable to pay. Google 8th grade Washington DC trip.

[inanna]

19. Yes, I've heard those trips to DC were very expensive

and well beyond the scope of affordability for many families.

I know my younger sister did go on a trip to DC several years ago while living in the US. I cannot recall if it was through school or a church. While there, I know she visited the Holocaust Museum, and remembers that quite well.

[jmowreader]

21. The only decent field trip I ever went on was in second grade

(I graduated from high school in 1981.)

I lived in Horseshoe Bend, Idaho. We went to a fire station, an egg farm and the state capitol. And like inanna said, a sack lunch and permission slip got you in.

The problem with North Idaho, where we moved during my third grade year, is that the vast majority of the history of Idaho that still exists is in South Idaho. We used to have Lake Steamers - paddlewheel ferries that crossed the lake from Harrison to Coeur d'Alene. In the 1930s, the residents up here decided to celebrate the Fourth of July one year by sinking five steamers and dynamiting the rest to the accompaniment of a brass band and fireworks. And a yooge part of the history that IS up here, little kids can't go in; the government would go ape shit if fourth-graders were taken on a tour of a lead mine. So...we visited the Mullan Trail Monument and visited the 80-square-foot Silver Valley Mining Museum, which was a converted dime store right across the street from one of Wallace's more famous houses of ill repute. (True story: there were five brothels in Wallace, and one of them was the U&I Rooms. So many students of the college in Moscow made the 250-mile round trip to frequent the houses, the U&I Rooms gained the nickname "University of Idaho, Northern Branch." There was also the "Oasis Rooms," which is now the Bordello Museum; the Sahara; the Lux; and the Luxette. Needless to say, we didn't get to tour that part of Wallace.)

[OhioBlue]

22. My son's school does at least one field trip each year K-8 but it wasn't always this way

We passed a much needed levy the year before he started Kindergarten. Before that, field trips were part of the cuts. We have had years where teachers did fundraisers for the trips, parents paid (a small amount like $10) and the past 2 years there has been no fundraising nor fees that I am aware of. 6th, 7th and 8th are bigger, overnight trips for which the students hold fundraisers and if they are very successful, can pay for most or all of their trip. If they don't have enough in their account to cover, the parents must pay for camp or D.C. trip.

Our PTA has also done some "family field trips" for which we get a group discount on either a teacher in service day or summer/spring break. These have ranged from an organized group visit to an apple orchard/pumpkin patch or just a discount at a local skating rink or Kalahari indoor water park that families can take advantage of.

I used to organize some of the PTA trips, but work schedule and cub scout outings have limited my time to do so and to participate.