Lisa loves Pooh said:
It's all dumb--most often it is tied to the money the schools receive..if your children are not there, they do not get credit finanically for that day for your student.
However--it is your student! Ultimately--you are their parent and not the school district.
I understand the reasons for the rules. However, I think they lost sight of the "good" reasons to have the rules and are more concerned with the money they will not get when your student is not there.
I agree. While I can see them emphasizing the need to be in school- I think it should basically be about the EDUCATION, not about the money. If your child falls behind because they went on vacation- well his grades will suffer. If your child is still doing fine and makes up all the work and is not behind (and doesn't cause the teacher to have to hold back the class for them to keep up) then what is the harm?
The "harm" now is money- it's all about money. I do NOT agree with the schools only receiving funding for how many students attend ON A DAILY BASIS EVEN! It's ridiculous. The school is still open all day (using utilities/etc.), the staff is all still there- but they get less money because Suzie is sick and David went to Disney World/etc. and they weren't there that day? It's the most ridiculous thing (to me atleast) for them to base funding on a DAILY attendance. I could see maybe basing it on attendance 80% of the year or something- so you get funding for the kids that are there the majority of the year or all year- (like not funding for kids not there but the first 6wks then move or something- not funding for them once they move!) but to do it on a daily basis is just ludricrous. I can't believe they do it that way! But they do.
I live in Texas and the laws are strict like someone mentioned on the first page of this thread. 3 days is truant- 6 unexcused absences in a QUARTER (not a 6wks!) and your child may be held back another year even if they have not fallen behind, know the work and kept up their grades. How is that about education? Hold them back purely on days missed because the school lost money those days? Nice.... real nice for the kid that has no control over how many days they are in school, huh? (excepting most highschool kids I guess- but for sure younger kids have absolutely not .0000000001% control over whether they are in school that day or not- not a bit of control over that matter!)
I have taken my kids out of school in the years past when they were in younger grades. At the schools they attended the principal left it up to the teacher and we just happened to have teachers that were very understanding about family time and when vacation time can be taken from work and most were not only excited about the kids going (and jokingly asking if they could go) but also realized the learning potential at WDW! It's educational too in many ways- to different degrees depending on what you do/make of it while there. I have one in 6th grade, one in 2nd grade and a very young (just turned 5) Kindergartener this year. So far the only time the older two have missed school is when we were on WDW trips- that's it! Not one sick day, no other days missed-yet if the teachers didn't agree to let them do the work ahead of time, during the trip or on their return from the trip... they would have been counted unexcused and on one trip it was 6 days so they could have both been held back a year! Ridiculous if that would have happened- not only perfect attendance except when missing for WDW trips (once a year until this year, a few days up to 6 days one time around Thanksgiving when they don't do much right before that anyway) but also are straight A students. Sounds ridiculous that they could have been held back for missing 6 days that year with straight A's the entire year huh? I think so!
However, we are not quite as quick to take our children out of school because our oldest is getting older, things are getting harder for both the oldest (even though they seem to be faring well so far and still making straight A's) and our youngest starting school so young (younger than our other two started Kindergarten due to their birthdays) -we didn't want anyone to get behind. Our cruise was planned over a year and a half in advance for Feb 2005 and we cancelled it late 2004 when we found out their school schedules changed that year. After years of having the same holidays/breaks they changed it drastically. Instead of a week off in Feb when that cruise was supposed to happen- they received no days off in Feb and only long weekends at other times where before they'd had an entire week (with 2 weekends on both ends of that week ofcourse) for those breaks. They would have missed more than a week of school the way the new schedule was- we cancelled it and booked it for June 2006 (needed to book it well in advance in order to not pay a fortune more for the trip than originally booked and we couldn't take a chance to book it during a school break considering the schedules might change AGAIN!) because of this and because our oldest was then (and now) out of elementary and thus had way more than just one teacher (to have to "get permission" from to do the trip). That means we'd have to have NINE different teachers (for her alone, not counting our son's main teacher & dual language/spanish teacher) agree for her to go on this trip and not be unexcused absence and allow her to make up all work (or do before the trip) and not fail any tests/work done during that week. We didn't want to risk taking the chance her grades would suffer due to 1 or more (possibly all) not agreeing to this and her getting all zeros all week long (papers, homework and tests). I'd know she'd know the material and not fall behind in that respect- but I also knew it would hurt her very much to get low grades when she'd always done so well (and still is) just because of the trip.
So now we decide not to take our kids out of school for vacations (at the present time), but it doesn't mean we're not EVER going to do so. We may... depends on the time, the situation and how our kids are doing in school- plus whether or not the teachers would agree. Regular trips to WDW are easier- we don't have to plan them SO far ahead. We can plan it during THAT school year so we can already see if the kids are still doing well in THAT grade/that year and also can see if the teachers are cooperative so they wouldn't end up getting failing grades and/or be held back a year just because of a trip! With cruises in order to save you have to plan WELL in advance -atleast a school year ahead with different teachers/etc... so we can't do those things for a cruies. We'll probably never plan a cruise during the school year because of this- but that doesn't mean we won't ever take them out of school again for a WDW trip or another vacation destination!
Our opinion is that it's up to the parents to decide whether or not it will work for their family and their children to take kids out of school for vacations. The proof of whether or not they made the right decision is how well the child does and if they fall behind afterwards or not.
It's not always wrong to take them out, and it's not always right either. It really just depends and only the parents of THAT child can know whether it's right for them or not, at that time. So others (like on this board and people in general) really shouldn't judge one way or the other. It's not always right, it's not always wrong.
She will keep a journal and do whatever homework there is but I'm not worried about. I agree that she's mine and I can make these decisions for her.
Vacations are definetely educational
