School and camping

We mostly worked around school schedules, but in middle school my son was in a charter school. We pulled him out twice for extended vacations. Rule was all homework had to be turned in when we got back PLUS he had to write an extra paper or do an extra project. One trip was to Hawaii, another to Disney. Hawaii involved extra work around volcanoes and Hawaiian culture, and Disney's was on rocketry as we took a side trip to NASA. I like a vacation to be a vacation-not stressing because I'm standing in line of hours at a time, smaller crowds, etc., so going at an off-peak time has other benefits. He's learned more outside the classroom than he ever will inside one.

For my son it was no issue-he was still well ahead of his class. We didn't do it in High School-too many rules about unexcused time off as well as the caliber of his classes. Taking all honors and A/P classes doesn't lend itself well to taking time off. Decisions should be made on a trip-by-trip basis and the child him/herself.

korbe wrote:
We always planned our campin' trips around school.

we do too...we go when school is in! :)

We always felt school was important so almost all of our trips were a workaround the school schedule. We were more inclined to take them out in elementary school than high school. But if I thought the situation warranted it I’d just tell the teacher and ask for the homework they’d miss, I never asked permission. But that was many years ago and perhaps things have changed.

Where we live, they are pretty strict on school. We have never taken our DS out of school for vacation. In the last couple of years, they have even changed early pickup. And since she started high school and marching band we've only had 1 1/2 month for vacation the last few years. We make up for it by planning a lot of short weekend trips. There are a couple of campgrounds within an hour or so from home, so I drop her off at school then drop the trailer off at the park and set up. Pick her up after school and take off. And she and dad take off for their hunting trips so she doesn't miss as much as you think she would.
So it isn't as relaxing as taking off for a longer period of time, but she will graduate in June. Get through her college years and who knows what we may do then!

Cyberschool so DD can take her work with her. She works ahead before the trip, then extra after the trip, so it is a pretty light schedule during the trip.

And we do believe a well rounded education includes both school and non-school items as well as family. Mind you, the things we do are in addition to her normal school workload. No slacking here ;)

Here in Western PA, our local school district will allow ONE family vacation time, up to 7 days. Not two trips of 3 days, not a couple of Fridays. Oh, and it must be approved by the SCHOOL BOARD in writing at least 2 weeks before the date. Doesn't matter about progress or grades, either. My DD was 97% overall for the year and still had these restrictions- until we changed that by moving to cyberschool two years ago.

We believe in goal based education. Complete the work in a proper manner. Sometimes it takes less time, sometimes more. But IMHO, just putting a fixed amount of time in a given location without regard to progress or outcome is more like moving prisoners than students ;)

The summer is for camping. It would have to be a pretty exceptional camping trip outside of that time to even think of pulling my daughter from school.

We've thought about the same and not sure on our schools policies. Our oldest started Kindergarten this year. We'd like to attend the state fairs in KS or OK maybe even TX. Would only be one day on Friday probably not a good excuse. We wouldn't take him out for amusement parks.. but maybe places like Mount Rushmore etc.

School comes first. I have had the RV parked at school on a Friday to leave direct but that is as far as I go. We only camp only on school breaks.

OregonSVT wrote:

doxiemom11 wrote:
Some schools only allow a child to be gone a certain # of days for a family function with permission and homework assigned. The higher the grade in school, the less time they want the child to be out of school. We did it once and had to get permission and a signed agreement from each teacher (jr. high). If we didn't do this, any absence longer than the 3 days allowed would have started dropping his grades. It's generally not a good idea to take your child from school for any length of time - they miss too much and have to catch up. Vacations can be planned around school schedules. School and education should be #1 on the list of priorities.

Not sure I completely agree with this. I'm a new parent, so I haven't had to start dealing with this yet, but are you really that concerned with your kids grades in Jr. High, as long as they perform well? You had to get "permission" to take your kids out? I would think it would go down more like "Our family is going out of town for a week and we need to get the homework / reading assigments...". More of a statement then a question to the school, remember, they work for you.

I agree with a few other people on here that there is more to learn then can be taught in a classroom. Books can't teach everything, experience means a lot.

I am going thru this right now. It mainly affects my DD in Jr. High, as my sons in elem. school CANNOT be failed due to excessive unexcused absences, per the district policies. The school will, however, turn us over to CPS for examination for truancy.

My MIL is having an extremely risky surgery in Houston, TX next week. We live in Maryland. I contacted the schools regarding my kids being absent for the first week, in order for ALL of us to be together in Houston, as a family. I was told my daughter WOULD FAIL the entire year if she has more than 3 unexcused absences PER QUARTER. It is in the handbook. Thankfully, the administrators in her school are counting the absences as excused, even though they technically are not per the handbook.

Being military, we have attended LOTS of schools in LOTS of states. All of them seem to have the same general policy, but many do not enforce it as written. Some districts are very lenient in what they consider "excused", even if it violates the policies. Others are beyond anal - in Moore, OK, we got investigated because of absences, even WITH notes from Dr.'s and dentists (which were the reason for the absences).

Only took them out once for a week when we went to Disney in Nov. otherwise we have almost 3 full months of kids off school. no need to take them out regularly for trips.