Pulaski

As there are already (in the UK and Europe, at least) all sorts of laws and regulations on paid time off, sick leave, maternity leave, so if there is a problem that needs fixing, and it sounds like there might be, the answer should be that anyone with a school age child should be entitled to take, say, half of their holiday time during school holidays.

The US, on the other hand, is too messed up for such an easy fix!

N1cky

Supply and demand, it's done for a reason. One of which is, if the prices were significantly lower the hotels wouldn't be able to cope with the demand thus creating a different problem.

scrubbedexpat099

I have noticed Tomatoes cost a lot more in the winter than the summer, perhaps they could do something about that at the same time?

Weeze

Days. One of my friends took her kid (elementary) out of school for 3 days to watch their dad compete in a charity iron man event. Now because they have been absent for three days they cannot miss even a day of school without a doctors note. If their child has a fever they are allowed to take the child into school to have the fever verified to prevent a doctors note being needed.

Anian

No wonder people homeschool, at least then you don't have to worry about silly things like that.

scrubbedexpat091

They can only charge what the market will bear, if the price can triple during certain seasons and people are still there to pay it, the the service is priced correctly.

If you don't want to pay the higher prices during high demand periods, simply don't go on a trip.

Basic supply and demand. Government should not artificially cap prices a company can charge.

Pulaski

The British government tried that with rents, back in the 60's, I think, or the early 70's. By the late 70's the supply of private rentals had more or less dried up. I can't imagine why?

RICH

Those of us without kids, would prefer to know we can vacation without kids. Stick to the school schedule , please.

kimilseung

Not sure I have much sympathy for taking kids out for the average package holiday, but travel can be a lot more than playing in the sea, and can be much more educationally beneficial to time in school.

One issue that I do have is just reinforcing the idea that school matters, that you don't just take time off for a mental health day, and holidays can kind of go against that. I also think that some parents are too selfish to think that it can not only affect their child but the rest of the class, as things lost during week n, can slow down things during week n+10. Especially with so much group work and peer teaching these days.

steveq

Precisely. We have explicit permission from the school for our trip over to the US next month, partly to scope out where we expect to move to in a few months, meet the team of guys that will be working for me and let the kids see their new school - they've been invited to shadow someone for the day....and then we're off to Florida to spend a week star-gazing in the Florida Keys. We've got geography, history and physics topics all lined up for them to report on when they get back...

scrubbedexpat099

Would you say that was the norm in these cases?

steveq

IF there is a defined educational content I'd say yes.

scrubbedexpat099

I meant is that the current situation, was your out of term activities the norm.

kimilseung

It would even be that hard to get all sorts of educational content in to a beach holiday, if the parents were prepared for a bit of effort.

kins

We took the children to Costa Rica a couple of years ago - that was an unbelievably educational holiday.

We're thinking about going to Mexico to stay in a villa or all-inclusive this year - it won't be all that educational but I do plan to visit Mayan ruins, swim in a cenote, take them to some of the small towns, and get them to practice their Spanish as much as possible.