Chesapeake, VA band can play at Disney, but not on the rides

An interesting article from a school in my local area.

http://hamptonroads.com/2008/08/great-bridge-band-can-play-disney-not-rides

Its certainly a sad state of affairs when schools have to be in damage control mode due to the litigious society we live in. Afraid a student may get hurt at an off site function to the point they have to ban them from enjoying themselves at a venue.

I always thought the waiver I used to sign in high school days was enough.. but apparently in today's world thats not enough.. just ban them completely.

Funny thing is they are raising the money to go to an event they cant enjoy.. Wheres the irony in that..

Since rides eat people alive this makes absolute perfect sense. Now if you'll excuse me I have my head to get out of my rear-end.

~Rob Willi

Chances are during the week of Christmas-New Years they would only get on about 1 ride anyway! And that would only be after they are released from their performance, take the bus back to the hotel, find transportation back to the park and hope there's time or room left in the park to enjoy anything. Personally, I can't think of a more miserable time to go.

School division officials aren't always known for making good decisions.

I think the policy is the school board's way of saying "we're tired of our kids acting like idiots on field trips to these parks" without making it sound like their kids are idiots. Note the "not enough supervision" quote. Ride safety is just a convenient excuse.
*** Edited 8/14/2008 8:24:01 PM UTC by Brian Noble***

Why is it they're afraid the kids will act like idiots on rides but not on the buses or in the hotel rooms?

Have they banned sports and cheerleading because of the possibility that kids will get injured? How about driving because somewhere some teenager was killed while driving?

It seems the school board wants the glory of having their school represented in the parades without any of the potential hassle. Whoever wrote this rule may have had good intentions, but they screwed up majorly in the execution. They need to re-write this policy.

I wonder how that may effect the band being invited to Disney. I always understood that a band that played at Disney on a trip like this had to spend some time in the park.

If they think this will keep them out of trouble, they are mistaken.

By brother took a well supervised trip to NYC with the High School band. They decided it would be fun to see how many of them could fit in an elevator. I don't know what the number was, but I'm pretty sure it was uncomfortable waiting for the fire department to come let them out after the cabin dropped a couple feet and went into E-stop mode.

Kids will be kids and trying to stop them is a pretty fruitless effort.

And since when is 1 chaperone per 4 students not enough? That sounds pretty standard to me. *** Edited 8/14/2008 8:47:20 PM UTC by Juggalotus***

^ How true bear. Kids can get into MORE trouble when they have nothing to do than when there's at least SOMETHING! I wonder how many kids will decide not to go?

How many chapraones do they need? a 2:1 ratio? ( chaprones to students) Plus, do they need to be tied together at all times? I guess they don't think the kids are mature enough.

"The rule was in response to incidents that happened elsewhere in which students were injured on park rides, he said."

Reading it again, it sounds like this rule is in place because of the sporadic incidents (SFKK, Mission Space, etc.)where someone gets injured/dies. Not in response to any specific incident with their school.

Is Ed Markey on the school board?

I thought it might've been Ralph Nader.

As my old high school band director would say..."You're here to do your job...the fun should be taking pride in the fact that a National Competition saw potential in you"...they just don't ask any band/choir/orchestra to participate in these kind of competitions.

This is the sole reason our high school band would never take a trip to Florida again. Too many students were into the whole Disney/Universal thing, and not concentrating on the National High School Music Competition.

I agree with the school board...they aren't signing off on a week trip for students to travel to a theme park to ride rides...yeah, you're marching in a Disney Parade, but that doesn't necessarily mean you have "all access" to the Disney Resort to do as you please. Visiting the park after your "job" is done is not a right, it's a privilege.

RCMAC is right...from my prior band trips to VA Beach, Orlando, and New Orleans...when you factor in the crowds of general guests and all the other people from the competitions (since they do the theme park tickets as a package deal) you'd be lucky if you rode more than 1 ride, especially at Christmas Time/New Years

Welcome to Nanny State. We live in a world where little snowflake can do no wrong so the school has to enforce other rules because little snowflake really does wrong but you can't tell the parents that.

Back when I was a kid we went on field trips all the time to Great America. We had maybe one or two chaparones for a group of thirty kids. They just let us all go and we met back up at the end of the day. Now, we didn't make idiots out of ourselves. We also did not do stupid things on rides to get hurt.

We didn't do those things because we all knew there would be consequences. Park security would haul our butt out of the park and wait with us until our chaparone showed up. Said chaparone would tell our parents and said parents would hit for distance and then ground us until we are eighty-two years old.

Now take same situation today. Say if even the chaparones cared and told the parents. I think most parents would be like, "Well, my little snowflake couldn't have done that. She's a perfect little angel."

Thus you have schools covering their asses because they are afraid of getting flak from Disney because their kids are destroying the park/getting hurt on rides and from parents who get angry calls from Disney/calls from Disney saying their kid is injured.

I can understand full well why they don't want those kids riding the rides if they go.

The basic problem is that the school district concocted a boneheaded policy that says they don't do field trips to amusement parks.

There are two problems here. One is that the band has been invited to perform at an amusement park. The other is that this is not a typical field trip. But the nature of the trip may provide the ultimate solution to the problem...

The answer is that going on the rides at the park is not part of the defined trip. The purpose of the trip is to perform and all that stuff. Because it is an overnight trip, it stands to reason that there would be a certain amount of down-time during which no activities are scheduled.

My prediction is that the "no rides" edict will come down from the school district, and be completely ignored by everyone on the trip, with the argument that "that wasn't part of the field trip; it's just something a [very large] percentage of the participants opted to do themselves during their down-time". And so long as nothing bad happens, nobody will actually care. Anyone who does has too much time on his hands and a nasty streak to go along with it.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

I think one of the biggest issues I have with this, and granted I have a friend whose child is affected by this, is the fact that its a school sanctioned event.. not a school SPONSORED event..

Which means the $$$s comes from the students/parents.. The school gains the name recognition for the trip as they represent at WDW. So they are basically telling them, "im glad you paid for it, but while you represent us, you are just playing instruments".

I say.. Good luck keeping that enforced while there. Parents/Chaperons arent going to want to deal with kids that are chomping at the bit to get on TOT, or R&R..

I agree with earlier comment.. Thats truly when children are apt to get into trouble..

Kids should be able to enjoy the park while they are there. Not every kid has a chance to go to Disney.

Let see, a large group of high school kids with limited adult supervision. Where are they most apt to get into trouble, WDW or Motel 6? My guess, many of them will find a way to turn an unsupervised hotel room into their own "Happiest Place on Earth." Alot of the guys will get a chance to play with some Big Thunder Mountains and the girls will get an upclose look at It's a Small World.

If that's the case, there'd be more lawsuits, arrests, and school board backlash.

I was on one of these trips when I was in high school, but not at that school.

We were cut free in the parks eevryday, with no chaperone, and just told when to be back on the bus. We had no problems, and our band and band front was probably around 175 students.

This is the dumbest idea I have ever heard.

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Anyone who does has too much time on his hands and a nasty streak to go along with it.

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Which is to say, "most of them"

-brian, who works with kids just a bit older than this every day.

^^ Gary, when I was in HS, I had two park trips back to back (one was the senior trip to FL & the other a band/chrous trip to CW) Both trips were the same way. We just had to check in with the charapones every couple of hours and be on thr bus by a certain time. No issues.