Attendance was a very serious matter when I was a school girl. Not that I ever had perfect attendance. Although others did, I was occasionally kept home with things like measles and mumps.
Had you asked my parents if they would take their children on a vacation during the school year, their response would have been an emphatic, NO!" How about if there was an educational nature to the trip? Like, for instance, a cruise to other countries? The answer would still have been no. To my parents, and their peers, nothing was more important than school for their offspring. To take us out of school for a pleasure trip was unthinkable.
While most of the children aboard my most recent late-January cruises were younger than school-age, there were others who'd obviously been taken out of class to accompany their families on cruise vacations. I can understand their parents' desire to take advantage of off-season fares, but that's as far as my understanding goes.
Travel can be uplifting, inspiring, and even educational. However, what kind of lessons do children learn when their parents take them out of school for a leisurely Caribbean cruise? That saving money on a vacation is more important than the children's education? That it's okay to be selfish?
To my way of thinking, their parents' behavior sends the wrong message to kids. No wonder we're facing the "me" generation.
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