Friday, September 12, 2008

[trips abroad] fraught business today


I used to run holidays for our school groups in the 90s and it's clear the situation has changed:

A statement on the XL group's website said: "The company's entered into administration having suffered as a result of volatile fuel prices, the economic downturn, and were unable to obtain further funding."

Bob Atkinson, of the price comparison website Travel Supermarket said XL's troubles would be a blow for the travel trade. He said: "They are a very large operator and this will send serious shock waves through the industry."

When I was involved in a lot of travel, Britain was known for its many tour firms which catered for schools, as well as the "bucket shops" where one could find a good flight to Australia for £650, as against the major airlines' £1950. All this appears to have gone by the board now.

Operators still seem to be in business and the prices look quite reasonable, all told but there is difficulties these days, including safety and litigation.

The Norfolk Blogger ran a piece on this in 2006, giving some sound reasons why teachers just won't touch these trips any more. In addition, there is the nature of the teenager in the school now and the changing culture in which he/she is growing up. The IPPR report was given the Daily Mail treatment but much of it still holds water.

Incidents I recall from two trips in the past:

There was a primary age child in our party and she was skiing towards the base of the hill where the piste narrowed to a little footbridge. The way we worked it was that one leader would ski up and down any hill where we knew our kids were and this gave them some freedom of movement but not a lot.

On this particular afternoon, I was just approaching her from further up the hill, shouting for her to get off the bridge, when two Germans [as we found out later] shot past and went straight across that bridge, knocking the girl over the parapet, into the shallow gully. She and I were lucky in that she was a tough little lady and it was the shock more than anything but still - it illustrates the problem.

Another was when one of our leaders who lacked confidence agreed to go down a blue slope with me and it was a case of snowploughing ahead of her, then stopping and waiting for her to ski across, then turning and repeating to the other side and so on. She became progressively happier about it as she went and so it continued until suddenly she lost all confidence, her skis turned down the hill, she panicked and took a tumble, falling awkwardly and injuring her leg, which put her out of the trip. This put a dampener on everything.

Imagine that today.

6 comments:

  1. My grandparents used to rely on those companies for their annual two weeks in the sun. It was one of their very few genuine luxuries.

    I was talking to the kids Principal this week and he says he struggles to get kids teachers to have a sleep over, far less a trip to a camp an hour away because of the hassles.

    Thunderdragons post on Matt Wardmann about the proposal to have a register of paedophile accusations would be enough to get me not to volunteer. Imagine being tarred by one accusation.

    Bring back the bad old days of risk and adventure.

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  2. I'm in this position now of thinking of going back to education but the stories I'm hearing and the fact of me just coming back cold to the UK makes me seriously consider not doing it.

    I think there are skills I have in teaching kids but it seems too tall an order just now. So I might seek a job in parks and gardens but even that is fraught too.

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  3. My daughter takes thirty 17 and 18 yr olds to France every year from the USA. Her big fear is that one of them will get pregnant. They do homestays so she does not have them under her eye all the time.

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  4. I think you will find that some of the teaching unions are advising members against taking school trips now. If I were still in secondary teaching in the UK I wouldn't get involved . Here Italian schools find it difficult to arrange exchanges with UK ones and one of the main reasons is that the Britrish students would find themselves going to school on the back of motorbikes and insurance companies won't cover the risk.

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  5. I would say teaching adults is the way to go, much less risky!

    I have a good friend who it a headmistress of a school. The tales she tells of how things have changed...

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