For many years I’ve written about the key to getting the most out of miles and points is having some flexibility. If you can only take a certain flight on a specific day, you’ll take or leave what’s available. But if you can shift your plans and take advantage of the awards that are available, when they come up, you can get orders of magnitude greater value – business and first class for the same price as coach, international long haul for the same price as domestic.
That’s because airlines are often making seats available on points that they don’t expect to sell for cash. And these spare seats aren’t likely to be on offer when everyone else wants to travel. That’s one of the reasons I’m a huge fan of ‘shoulder season’ where it’s great to visit a destination but there aren’t as many people there. The visit is more enjoyable, and it’s much less expensive too.
We don’t talk enough about how much difficulty families with children have in making this happen. I have a daughter who is six now so it’s very much top of mind for me. Planning ahead, I can take time off from my day job. And as more or less a ‘knowledge worker’ I can work from anywhere. But schools have attendance requirements.
- Families should focus on programs that make award space available when their booking calendar opens, and especially airlines like British Airways which guarantee minimum availability at that time.
- And watch for availability ‘dumps’ and mistakes throughout the year, which are easier to take advantage of now that so many programs have eliminated change and cancel fees. When you see an award that might work with school holidays, grab it and think later if your points are in one of those programs. (Cancel fees really added up when multiplied out across a family.)
Many families just face the boot of the public school bureaucracy when they seek any flexibility at all for their travel.
The story of one father is being virally resurfaced in social media, for when he qualified for the Boston Marathon and let his kids’ school know months in advance that they were going to take the trip together as a family.
He received a nastygram back from the school after the trip that they do not “recognize family trips as an excused absence” and as such they’d be penalized for 3 unexcused absences and “accumulation of unexcused absences can result in a referral to our attendance officer and a subsequent notice of a violation of the compulsory school attendance law.”
The father wrote back:
Dear Madam Principal,
While I appreciate your concern for our children’s education, I can promise you they learned as much in the five days we were in Boston as they would in an entire year in school.
Our children had a once-in-a-lifetime experience, one that can’t be duplicated in a classroom or read in a book.
In the three days of school they missed (which consisted of standardized testing that they could take any time), they learned about dedication, commitment, love, perseverance, overcoming adversity, civic pride, patriotism, American history, culinary arts, and physical education.
They watched their father overcome injury, bad weather, the death of a loved one, and many other obstacles to achieve an important personal goal. They also experienced first-hand the love and support of thousands of others cheering on people with a common goal.
At the marathon, they watched blind runners, runners, with prosthetic limbs and debilitating diseases, and people running to raise money for great causes run in the most prestigious and historic marathon in the world. They also paid tribute to the victims of senseless acts of terrorism and learned that no matter what evil may occur, terrorists cannot deter the American spirit.
These are things they won’t ever truly learn in the classroom.
In addition, our children walked the Freedom Trail, they visited the site of the Boston Tea Party, the Boston Massacre, and the graves of several signers of the Declaration of Independence. These are things they WILL learn in school a year or more from now. So in actuality, our children are ahead of the game.
They also visited an aquarium, sampled great cuisine, and spent many hours of physical activity walking and swimming.
We appreciate the efforts of the wonderful teachers and staff and cherish the education they are receiving at Rydal Elementary School. We truly love our school. But I wouldn’t hesitate to pull them out of school again for an experience like the one they had this past week.
Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Michael Rossi
Father
The school district responded saying, though, that the most important thing for children to learn is rule-following.
I believe it is our job as parents to make sure that our children understand the importance of rules, that rules should be followed, and that there are consequences for breaking rules.
I suppose there’s some value in receiving the acculturation in rule-following necessary to become a salaryman: a loyal, white-collar employee of a big corporation (middle-class office worker). But this also has the school saying the quiet part out loud.
- One of the primary criticisms of public schools – and even many private schools – is the standardized curriculum. State curriculums have specific, uniform requirements, leaving little room for adaptation or innovation and that may not resonate with or represent the diverse student population, and that limits critical thinking and creativity. Indeed, here the school says that is the point, do not think for yourself follow the rules!
- The emphasis on conformity in public schools extends beyond the curriculum to the overall learning environment. Rigid classroom structures suppress individual expression and creativity. There’s too much “teaching to the test.” And public schools can also foster an environment of social conformity, leading to social exclusion and bullying.
- The truth is that the rules matter for the school. Since government funding for each school is usually based on an attendance formula, attendance is what matters. And what counts as attendance matters even more still.
- Meanwhile dumbing down the kids is a feature, not a bug. Kids who just sit there and are docile are easier for teachers to manage, and too many schools are run for the teachers rather than the kids (even as the teachers suffer from the conformity as well).
We need more travel where it’s possible, not less. And flexibility when you travel makes that possible, and makes that affordable, so that more people can do it.
We also need more families participating in life moments together, not fewer. From a public policy perspective, surely that’s an important goal that shouldn’t get lost in the funding formula – rules following rubric.
Build good relationships with your kids teachers, and their school administrators. Try to work with them to develop a plan that will allow travel beyond the school calendar’s explicit days off. Children will get more out of their social studies lessons if they’ve visited the places they’re ostensibly learning about. They’ll get more out of foreign language. They’ll have broader horizons that help them develop, and greater self-confidence. Surely that’s more valuable than the marginal day behind a desk in the classroom.
school prerogative. no wonder school system has gone down. he could have taken a trip with his kids during school break.
Good for these parents. Children will learn far more traveling than they would in government-run indoctrination centers.
Woah, umm, you can also keep kids in school, and just travel with them, using points, but, like, during breaks, even if there aren’t ‘perfect’ deals, it’s still good enough, oh, and, education is good, too. Or not. We can just do the speed-run to idiocracy. Shhyup.
Some events such as the Boston Marathon are date specific. I bet if you could poll the kids many have never traveled out of state or even out of the county where they live. Travel is so educational & there is no substitute for these experiences not even from a textbook.
Just please don’t ask your teachers do perform double the work or ask them to have lesson plans available before you leave. They have a job, but they’re job isn’t dependent on you and your families schedule.
“He received a nastygram back from the school after the trip that they do not “recognize family trips as an excused absence” and as such they’d be penalized for 3 unexcused absences and “accumulation of unexcused absences can result in a referral to our attendance officer and a subsequent notice of a violation of the compulsory school attendance law.””
Ugh.
This is a terrible look. But often it is no more than documenting what might be actual issues. Many schools and teachers actually tolerate absences to let families be families and to provide enriching experiences of field trips on steroids. But they know there is a thankfully minority of students who come from challenged households which cannot manage to get the kids to school. Those teachers and schools have to document, document and then document some more to take action. A friend’s high functioning 7 year old recently spent 30 days of second grade in another country visiting family. It got recorded, and the teacher was somewhat apologetic about the pro forma email she had to send.
If one gets such a notice, chill. It is not likely intended for your situation – instead it is necessary for your kids’ peers in case the school needs to intervene.
I wouldn’t expect a school official to respond with anything less or anything more- that person is doing their job that the taxpayers are paying them to do. The response letter was completely fair.
I also expect that every educator (including the administrator who wrote the letter) who read that father’s letter smiled silently and broadly.
Great job by the dad writing the letter. It’s a bit passive-aggressive (lol, okay maybe a lot), it gets his point across, but he also has enough grace to say something positive about the school and the people working there. He’s setting a pretty good example for his kids.
Sure, take your spawn out of school.
Just don’t expect anyone to cater to them when they fall behind or fail. Life goes on without them.
With advanced notice most school districts can accommodate an educational absence. This will require some effort from parents but it is well worth it. Teachers already have lesson plans approved ahead. If your child is doing well and has a good attendance record this shouldn’t be a problem. But remember parents, this will be extra work for you.
Follow the money. Each child at school wins the school a certain amount of money from the state. A child not at school is viewed as costing the school a loss of money.
@Gary: totally agree, take the children so they can see the world at these off-peak times as well. They will gain as much from the trips as sitting in a classroom with kids spawned from some of your commenters above. Yes, looking at you crabby old men that probably have kids with the same narrow minded outlook as you. I took my daughter from school once a year and she has seen and experienced more by 12 than most of your readers. And by-the-way, schools supported it and she graduated with honors from UCLA.
The dad’s letter to the school surely smells of AI/chatgpt generation, I’m 99% sure it is!
Gary, you are sufficiently wealthy that you don’t have to find the perfect deal in order to take your daughter on a trip. There’s an equity issue when certain members of a class can be missing because their wealthy parents are taking them on a trip (Where’s Suzie? Oh, she’s not in class because she’s in Bora Bora this week), while less favored kids can’t dream of such a thing. Or maybe you’re at an elite school where you don’t think about that, because everybody’s wealthy and free to come and go as they please, but then the rest of the post doesn’t really apply. What happens during vacation times (about 12-15 weeks a year most places) is a different matter.
People who think they don’t have to follow rules because they’re special and too good for the rules may become fantastic innovators, but they may also become the worst sort of entitled jerks (or both).
@DaveS – points are an equalizer here, not between the rich and poor but between the ‘sufficiently wealthy’ and those of more moderate means.
If you say you want to work on ways to help improve opportunities for kids who are among the least well off, I endorse that. If your solution is to address inequities by taking away opportunities from the rest of kids, then you’re pretty evil.
That dad sounds like a giant bitch. So he wanted to run the Boston but was too cheap to hire people to watch the kids. The kids didn’t get anything out of watching their dad run. Calling a trip to Boston “a once-in-a-lifetime experience” is delusional.
Would I prefer traveling with kids during off-peak days cause it saves a little bit of money, sure. But I care about the kids being in school and with their friends. We keep two full time nannies to help and hire the kids teachers to teach them in the summer because I’m not a bitch like that dad.
It would have to be a pretty bad school for the kids to have learned more eating great food and watching their dad run a race than they would have in class instruction. The dad’s whole letter was an unconvincing justification to me. Any parent who pulls their kid from school just to get a good deal on points redemption isn’t going to qualify for dad of the year in my book.
Anything that gets children out of the public school system, i.e., indoctrination centers, is a good thing. Bertrand Russell informed us that, “men are born ignorant, not stupid. They are made stupid by education.”
It’s more than just a trip.
Putting your kids in public schools is the worst thing you could do to their future.
They are designed to make sure kids adapt to the societal mold so they get the education they need to get a job, so they can spend and grow debts that will make the societal leader rich, then if they have been good societal slaves all their lives they will be awarded a pension which will allow them to retire in a mobile home in Kansas.
That may sound exaggerated but this is exactly the principle of Western societies in the US, EU, and other countries. I have lived in enough countries in the world to have realized this is a universal principle, the “middle class” has to be sacrificed for the greater good of the leaders.
The only way to break that cycle is to teach your kids how to become leaders instead of societal slaves. Unfortunately, for that to happen, you need to send your kids to private schools (the good ones) or home-school them if you know what to teach them.
@Gary, no I’m not saying you shouldn’t take trips with your kids just because some parents and kids can’t. I know I take a lot of trips that a lot of people can’t. I am saying think twice about pulling a kid out of school against the rules to do it, if the justification is just getting a better deal when you could easily afford to do the trip during the 12-15 weeks school isn’t in session.
It is important to travel to learn about the world.
I have had lost the faith in the school system this year. We had similar incident of not allowing excused absence for a national competition with the response that they will provide excused absence only for school district conducted competition. The bad part is the school district do not conduct anything for first graders. I pulled him away anyway for three days.
At the end of the year when the teacher returned the unused supplies and journals, I have noticed they did not use half the supplies and the journal has maximum of 5 pages filled for each subject.
The teacher apparently doesn’t check what the kids are doing and let them watch TV (YES TV) for an hour a day.
I have taken my daughter out of school over the years – sometimes weeks – to experience international travel – Cuba , Argentina , Morocco , I’m nov we missed school for france and Belgium – she’s studying French and European history – we toured louvre twice , Versailles , castles , notre dame , all over both experiencing French immersion , interacting with a host family
We went then because it was an extension of thanksgiving holiday / that 5 days of international immersion was something you can’t learn in a classroom. I’m a decorated veteran – a great rule follower but also a believer that there are things you can’t learn in a classroom ! I have a masters in international management but never was lucky enough to travel with family as it was cost prohibitive . I have learned travel hacking to stay free and can’t often go during the holidays as everything is twice as costly .
I have gotten many of the bad parent letters but as a mom of a 13 year old who’s been to 57 countries islands and territories (6 continents ) my daughter is now self-learning Korean ! I have no regrets…
You can say all you want about rules and discipline – but I survived a horrific accident (wheelchair) and will always live by “carpe diem”!
I have done this multiple times, for immersion trips to Japan, to visit Costa Rica, to go to New York. We always incorporate learning activities with the fun, and my kids are far more aware of the state of the world than the average kid their age. (We’ve always done it using air miles.)
They ‘follow rules’ just fine! They don’t cheat, don’t lie, and are always on the honor roll and in advanced classes. My oldest starts college this fall studying engineering.
I’d argue that the lesson that needs to be learned is flexibility.
In the fall of 1979 I was 16 and my parents took me and my brother 16 to Orlando to go to Disney. We were pulled out of school first week of November
I never said I wanted to go. It was parents idea. I think it was really my dad’s.
We drove by it being built in 1969 my dad came from a dry county never saw a tv until he was in the navy.
Just after that trip he was diagnosed with cancer. He got over it but died 5 years later
Pull your kids. Life is a banquet and some are starving to death
It’s easiest to pull kids out of school when they are in the elementary and middle school ages. Past that, and the grades really matter, and an unexcused absence can have impacts on their grades, which may impact their college admissions. Additionally, student athletes or musicians miss practices which can affect their position in teams or band/orchestra/choir.
In the big scheme of things, are these really important? Probably not, but by then, they are old enough to have input into their plans.
I did this. I pulled 13 year old Krystle out of school for a whole quarter in 7th grade and traveled nine countries in Europe with her by train. That trip with Krystle is one of the foremost highlights of my life. (They gave me her books and curriculum and we did her classes on the trains, trusting my ability to educate her.) She finished her entire school work in just four weeks of so. I also created an art and architecture curriculum for her so she could appreciate and understand all she would see and an information sheet on each country. We based out of Switzerland and then traveled to Germany, Austria, Luxemburg, France, Norway, Denmark, Liechtenstein, and Sweden, staying with families we knew from hosting exchange students. She had already been to Switzerland and Italy the year before. She learned more in that trip than many children learn in 12 years of school. I understand that most families wouldn’t be able to do this, but if you can, do it!
Before middle school no one should have any guilt taking their kids out of school for 7-10 days per school year to do anything else they want to do with their children. Travel with children is an incredible experience for the parents and children and should be encouraged.
Yes, public schools train you for yesterday’s economy or how to be a soldier.