Saturday school vs. tournament

[Amy in AZ.]

I lean more and more towards home schooling, every day. I doubt that my DD allows me to do that with GDD, but I am fed up with organized school. I have a lot of home schooled students. They still play school sports, if they desire.

What about students that work? Do this miss work, for Sat. school?

 

[rdbass]

My DS is going on 12 school years of perfect attendance 1-12 grade. DD is working on 10 years of perfect attendance 1-10 grade. So, my children would be in school. School is important to us.

 

[sportinus]

Ok my 2cents worth.

1) God
2) Family
3) Schooling
4) Softball Or other things

 

[CoogansBluff]

What about students that work? Do this miss work, for Sat. school?

This affects only elementary and middle schoolers here. High schoolers are on traditional school calendars, perhaps for this very reason.

 

[knightsb]

My DS is going on 12 school years of perfect attendance 1-12 grade. DD is working on 10 years of perfect attendance 1-10 grade. So, my children would be in school. School is important to us.

Wow, that is amazing.

 

[Elk Grove Hurricane]

I'd be really tempted to have her play. I wouldn't push it, though, and I'm 95% sure that my kid would choose school. Is there any chance she can play a game or two late on Saturday if she attends school?

 

[Alsmygal]

I'm a high school principal and we have had 17 snow days so far this school year. Luckily, we haven't had to schedule any Saturday school like some of the schools around us. We have taken away spring break and just about every scheduled day off the rest of the year. Anyway, that being said, I know my dd's team really counts on her to be at the tournaments more than the school counts on her to be in class. I never thought that I would be one to say miss school and go play in the tournament, but I know if it were my daughter, she would be playing ball. I would also give an excused absence to any student who was going to miss a suddenly planned Saturday school because of prior commitments....... just my two cents.

 

[JJsqueeze]

tournament or no tournament, if our school rescheduled school to a Saturday my daughters would not be going. I would get the assignments and have them do the work (probably about 2 hours of actual work) sometime during the weekend. Weekends are our family time, weekdays are for work and school. And something tells me that the day would be mostly a waste of time anyway.

 

[CoogansBluff]

I'd be really tempted to have her play. I wouldn't push it, though, and I'm 95% sure that my kid would choose school. Is there any chance she can play a game or two late on Saturday if she attends school?

Yes, good possibility. School will be 8:15-11:45 (not a full day), and tournament is fairly close by. Waiting to get the tournament schedule.

 

[Indiana]

Our state has a lot of hockey players who miss a fair amount of school for tournaments. Being somewhat geographically isolated, many of the hockey kids have to miss Friday and/or Monday school in order to travel out of state. Our high school has a pink slip that the kids fill out, and then get each teacher to sign. The slip is then countersigned by an administrator, and the student has a documented excused absence. The student of course has to make up the work missed, but has a few days to do so when he or she returns.

We all say, "academics first", but what does this mean, realistically? College athletes regularly miss classes. High school students often miss classes for afternoon games, or sometimes a full day of classes for a high school tournament. I think that putting academics first means balancing the commitments to school and sport. We need to teach our kids how to do well in school under the challenge of missing classes, otherwise they will get to college lacking this very important skill. I would be honest about why my daughter is missing Saturday classes and have her talk to her counselor and teachers about making up the missing work. If the school is going to dig its heals in and count any absence as unexcused, then you have no choice but to attend school, but hopefully your school will see the benefit of teaching their student athletes how to cope.