I’ve never understood how WDW can be busy at times like this, i.e. when kids are supposed to be in school. I know you people had a public holiday on Monday, but I’ve seen photos of crowds yesterday and am wondering how they are actually there.
So many schools are remote these days. “Remote school” can range from being “live” 6 plus hours a day, to 3 hours a day where a teacher might pop in every once in a while. I know some schools where there are days when work is posted and a student never sees a teacher, or all instruction is recorded.
More families can do both this year.
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In PA students are given 5 educational trip days a school year. My parents used them to go to DW both times we went with them (October and February) and so far we have used them 2 times with our kids. We went in September 2016 and May 2018.
Do you have them this year?
Wow! In Massachusetts those are “unexcused absences” for most districts.
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They have them every year. We have a trip “scheduled” in May, the week before Memorial Day. If we decide to keep that trip, then we will use those days.
PA does not use daily attendance to determine school district funding. At least not in the sense that other states do. If half the school is out sick, it does not affect funding in any way.
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There are always lots of people and kids at WDW, any time of the year. If they are there when WDW has 100% capacity, I should think it’s ever easier to have them when it is at 25% capacity.
Some parents also refuse to travel during holiday periods when everyone else is traveling. 🙋
I will take my kids out of school and unexcused absences be damned. I’m sure I’m not the only parent who feels that way.
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It is estimated that there are at least 2 million students homeschooled in the United States each year…and I wouldn’t be surprised if the numbers are higher now. So, while not necessarily a majority, I would expect a decent percentage are homeschooling families during these times. We were one of them. We could adjust our school year around our vacations and not the other way around, which means we could always choose to go when attendance was at its lowest.
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A growing number of states and districts in those states start school early (end of July, beginning of August). Then they take a fall break after the first 9 weeks are over. Those fall break weeks hit (depending on district) from the last week of September and throughout October. Our district’s was last week, neighboring district’s is this week. I personally have lived in 2 different states with this type of school schedule.
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in addition to the other things - remote learning, home schooling, parents just taking their kids out - there are a lot of systems that have Fall Break this week because of Indigenous Peoples’ Day on Monday.
I am here this whole week with my child because he Is off school for the week for fall break.
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I have seen some non-WDW resorts advertising “schoolcations” meaning the kids just bring their laptops and attend school from the hotel room. I do think parents are using the remote schooling situation to their advantage and traveling whenever they want. I also wonder if we’re seeing the influx of spring/summer trips that were rescheduled for Fall?
I’ll be honest, as a parent (with no homeschooling experience) of 3 remote learning kids at home I am ready on any given day to say “Forget it! We’re going WDW!”. Lots of stressed out parents are at the end of their rope and need an escape at the moment.
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yep! cuz who wants to be forced to travel when all the travel prices are jacked up (gas, lodging, airfare) and its miserably too hot outside… nope… we’ll cut school, save some money and enjoy better weather.
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As a couple of others have posted, many school districts start earlier and have more breaks during the year, and since Monday was a federal holiday, many school districts schedule a multi-break to coincide with the holiday.
Our daughter’s school system always has a weeklong break in late September and we’ve done Disney trips in 6 out of the 11 years she’s been in school.
I have done this too. We always work with the teacher to get school work done. We’ve only done long weekends though Thursday- Mondays.
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I think there are a growing number of districts (in the south particularly) that do year-round school with the tracking system. My niece and nephew in NC do 9 weeks on and 3 weeks off the entire year. So at any point in time 1/4 of the school is “off” throughout the entire year. I actually think it is a cool setup if your school has AC in the summer.
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We get 10 unexcused absences per school year in NJ before it becomes a truancy office problem. That doesn’t count doctor’s visits or illnesses that a doctor issues a letter for. It things like a death in the family.
So if I take my kid out for a week, that’s still 5 days shy of the threshold. I just make sure to get doctor’s notes for any sickness and it’s never been a problem.
Now, when they get to a certain age, it does become more problematic. My 11th grader isn’t coming with us this November, bc at this stage, she can’t afford to miss that much school with graduation and college on the horizon. There is only one school in the state that offers a degree in her chosen field (mortuary science) so she has to be on her best game.
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I once had a on-line discussion with one of the Touring Plans statisticians about the school breaks. They track the breaks of the largest school districts. Pretty much there is some school district on at least a one day break for just about every week of the year except for the first full week of January and the week after the Labor Day holiday in September.
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Preach.
It’s MEA in Minnesota - mid-October we have Thursday/Friday off for teachers to attend conference (I think it’s Minnesota Educators Association?). So lots of families travel, either just for the 4 day weekend or take the whole week. Work is a ghost town every year.
We had originally rescheduled our spring break trip to this week.
Before our oldest hit middle school, we pulled them out for a week vacation twice (early February, not October). Our district allows kids to miss up to 5 consecutive days for family vacations. Elementary teachers never had an issue.