Teen travel with school group to Paris

[Anonymous]

Would you allow your 7/8th grader to go to Paris France with a school group trip with the climate in the world right now. I am worried about the terrorism that keeps occurring around the world. Thoughts on this? Why yeah or nay. I was all for it a year ago, but now I am a bit unsure. I also don't know that the school has a good emergency plan.

[Anonymous]

Let your kid go. Everything in life has risks, including staying in Washington and going to school, at least until we get our gun culture under control.

This is a trip she’ll never forget, especially if she’s never been out of the country before. I know a mom who didn’t let her kids go on a field trip to NYC six months after 9-11, and the kids still think it was ridiculous.

Help your school develop an emergency plan. If it’s important to you, do some research, create an emergency plan yourself and give it to the trip leaders.

[Anonymous]

Yes. The odds are incredibly minuscule that anything would happen and they could happen anywhere (including here). I don't want to encourage fear in my kids and we shouldn't stop living our lives and traveling. Driving down the road is probably the most dangerous thing we do with our kids and we don't hesitate to do that on a daily basis.

[Anonymous]

Nope. Very elitist/expensive/unnecessary/potentially unsafe.
This is truly a top 0.1% problem.

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't not let her go because of terrorism. query whether that is too young of age to really get the most out of the trip, but that is a different issue and if the money is not a barrier, it is probably worth it.

[Anonymous]

Yes. My kids are a bit older and both of them have traveled outside the US several times in the last year (including Paris and Barcelona, sites of recent attacks). We really didn't worry about it. I would make sure your DC has a mobile phone and turn on the international phone/data plan.

[Anonymous]

OMG, I did this. We went to Paris for 2 weeks with our school (Catholic High School). We stayed at a small hotel and met two super hot guys (in their mid 20s) who worked there. We sneaked out 3 times and they would take us (me and 3 friends, all 16 years old) to clubs and bring us home by 5am through the hotel back door. I didn't hook up with either of the guys, but we all got silly drunk. One of my friends did hook up with one of the guys and I know she lost her virginity there. The teacher in charge of us had no clue. Tread carefully, now I think about everything that could have happened to us. I won't let my daughter go.

[Anonymous]

The terrorism issue wouldn't bother me (very much), but I also went on trips like this as a kid and looking back, we were totally unchaperoned. Lots of parents/teachers on the trip, but also lots and lots of 'on our own' time in big cities, and very easy to leave hotel room after the 'lights-out' checks. I'm very grateful my parents let me go, but I don't think I'll be making the same decision for my own kids...

[Anonymous]

can you go??

[Anonymous]

No parents are allowed. Just teachers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: No parents are allowed. Just teachers.

Teachers don't pay attention to the kids. My DS went on a school trip last year and told me about how they all left after lights out and stayed out until 4 am. They either went out into town, or the girls came into their room or both. Totally unsupervised half the time. Apparently the teachers were all pretty busy partying themselves. Private school, FWIW.

I just consider myself lucky that my DS is a pretty straight arrow in that he didn't drink or do anything really bad, just enjoyed his freedom and then told me all about it, including what some of the other kids did--which was "worse" (depending on your POV).

[Anonymous]

My daughter did this trip in 8th grade and loved it. This was 4 years ago, however. I think now, even with the world the way it is, I'd still allow it.

Two years ago she went to Italy as part of another school trip and I went with her on that trip.

A total of 16 students, 2 teachers, and 8 parents went on the trip. Each room had 2 students and a parent in it so there was no sneaking out at night. The kids did get 2 hours of free exploring time each day during the daylight hours, but if they did not check back in on time, they lost the privilege for the rest of the trip. All of the kids who went on the trip were 15-17 and we had no issues with drinking or trying to sneak out.

The year before I entered 9th grade, the high school I went to eliminated senior class trips because a bunch of the seniors graduating that year thought it'd be a brilliant idea to drink their way through an amusement park. It was a huge thing in our town because the kids who smuggled the booze in and who drank were all of the top students in the school. Their punishment was that none of them could participate in graduation, which meant that the valedictorian and salutatorian that year were both number 14 and 15 in the class. So the drinking and sneaking around can happen even if the class trip is domestic.

[Anonymous]

It's not Paris but I'm letting my 7th grader go to Mexico with a school group next spring for spring break.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Nope. Very elitist/expensive/unnecessary/potentially unsafe.
This is truly a top 0.1% problem.

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[Anonymous]

Have you traveled as a family or is this her first international trip? We have traveled a lot but I don't think I'd spend the money for them to go alone before high school. Just don't think they would get much out of it.