Hellobee Boards

Speaking from the teacher's angle. We do have some kids who are taken out of school for vacations, even in middle school. In our state, all non-school absences are unexcused. So illnesses are unexcused. And I think our number is similar--10 days before it becomes a truancy issue. So with an illness, if you are out more than 10 days, our state would assign you a home instruction teacher that would come to your house on certain days to give you work and keep you caught up. Obviously, for a vacation, I wouldn't risk it--so it's a numbers game. If you are reasonably sure your child won't need those days for illness, if you are sure your child can make up all the missed work in a timely manner, if you are sure this wont stress out your child even more, then why not?

We've even had families withdraw their kids from school entirely when they have a long trip planned--say, to india. When their kids are fully withdrawn from school, they do not have to do any schoolwork while they are away, but they do have to re-register and they may not get all the same classes when they return.

One thing I should point out, is that public schools receive funding based on school attendance. And their rating usually has an attendance component, too. So if everyone was pulling their kid out for vacations, the school will be dinged financially and through ratings. Like my friend was shocked that our state issued new school report card, and her excellent suburban school district had 1 area of "low achievement". When I looked up the actual scoring profile, they were dinged very specifically for low Asian attendance. Specifically Asians (all the measurements are broken down into sub pops). This is a very well-to-do area. So my friend was like, why is there a problem with the asian students attending school? And I could only surmise that those families were more likely to pull their kids for long trips to India/China. And the reason doesn't show up in the state report card, it just dropped their school's ranking a bit down the list, and you know some parents are really competitive about living in a district with the "best" schools.

No, I don't. There are 10 excused absences per year and after that, the principal is obligated to report you to the state for truancy. It also impacts funding, so unless it was an illness, I wouldn't do it.

I get that it's a bear to all be on vacation at the same time, but if everyone takes their kids out and asks for work packages to be sent home, it becomes a distraction and takes away from instructional time.

Our school district strongly discourages parents from taking kids out for vacations. However, they do have a process for it. You have to submit it for approval at least a month in advance and if approved, you have to get all the school work the child will miss and turn it in when you get back.

Personally, I probably won't because we don't usually do big vacations during the school year.

I am this year but only because it's an important trip for extended family. I anticipate this being the only year that I will do that.

We probably will. My husband gets breaks that don't line up with school breaks. I don't think there's a limit here (Ontario, Canada). Most of my friends pull their kids for vacations.

We missed a week here and there for vacations growing up all the way through high school too.

@gingerbebe: we often did this too, we never were allowed to stay home for illness but we did take off for vacation. Honestly, life is short, there are many years of school and a lot to be learned through travel. When my sister was in high school and I was in grade school she told me skip or take off as much as you can because it’s much harder to miss high school and I think that same sentiment holds through life. Like being an adult sucks and I can never choose to not go to work today so I’m all for letting the kids be kids and travel and all of that. I always tell my students on rotation take a block or semester or year off if you can. You will never get that opportunity again.

My daughter starts K in the fall and we are planning to take 5 days off for a Disney cruise. I’ll try to avoid it otherwise, but it’s a private school and their policy is you can’t miss a month without losing your spot. I’m not sure how they’ll actually feel about it, but it’s well within the policy allowance.

Once the kids start public I would be less likely to take a whole week, but a day or two here and there for family visits is going to be unavoidable as long as we live across the country from our family.

I wouldn't hesitate to because I know the main reason schools care is because attendance is tied to funding. That said, I think my decision to would be on a case by case basis. If my child was struggling in school as it is and falling behind, I wouldn't. But if they were doing well and I thought a lot could be gained by going on a trip, I would. I wouldn't want my kids to miss out on world experiences just because of school.

My DD is in K this year and we have taken 3 days of vacation. They were the day after Labor Day (driving back from Mexico is much easier the day after) and the Monday and Tuesday before thanksgiving (I was flying solo cross country Erin 2 kids, Wednesday was a holiday, so I just booked tickets for the full week).

My DD is on target with her educational skills so I didn’t feel like it would risk her progress. I think we will probably do similar day or two here and there for the next few years but stop by 3-4th grade.

We do know families who pull out for like a week and that seems like a lot, but it is kindergarten not senior year.

This has me kind of stressed out because DH gets 2 vacation weeks a year, and he has to work during vacation season because he's flying everyone around to their vacation destinations. So this year we have late September and early December. If we want to travel as a family it will have to be during non vacation seasons.

We are looking at private schools solely for this reason even though I work for a prosecutor's office responsible for going after truancy issues and it really has to be bad before something is done. So I don't think we would get in trouble but not sure I want the hassle.

I know I'm late to this discussion, but I just wanted to address all the "schools just care about the funding" comments about absences.

I am a public high school teacher and having students miss a week really hurts the student's ability to succeed in the class and makes a lot of extra work for the teacher. A typical unit for my topic is 3 weeks long, so when a student misses a full week, then spends a week trying to catch up, the teacher is having to spend a fair amount of time reteaching content as they go along and the student doesn't have a good chance of picking up all they missed. I currently have one of my best studentslikely to make a B on this report card because she missed 6 days due to illness and she didn't get a great understanding of the material and performed poorly on the test despite doing makeup work on her own and coming to tutoring.

If you are going to take your kid out for vacation, it's imperative that you contact the teacher before and make a plan, and that you adjust your expectations. At young ages it may be easy to catch up, but it may not at older ages.