School ski trip cost

A snowHead

Can anyone share how much their children’s school ski trips cost?

Just curious… my child’s school has just advertised one for Easter holidays next year at ~£2200, which is a lot but it is in Canada!!

A snowHead

£1K less, to Saalbach. Which is hardly slumming it. It’s up with Ischgl as the fastest lift system in the world. Canada seems an unusual choice as the cultural aspect of going to a country with a foreign language is missing. But I suppose the snow is likely to be better Puzzled

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Its the schools trip arms race, got to be bigger & better than last years and to the school down the road.

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Might be where the teachers fancy going ?
Bet it’s East Coast Canada and they ain’t got a clue what the skiings like .

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Wow - that is impressive that they have got it all in for £2200 to be honest if it’s Canada. But if that’s for just 6 days skiing that’s a long way to go and the kids will be shattered… no time to recover from the journey. our school is £1500 for a shortened trip of 5 days in Europe.

After all it is free

Our school has a few different trips- the one my kids do is to Italy for a week and is about a £1500, including small group race coaching.

My understanding is that a huge challenge for school trips is getting enough teachers to go along. At least at our school, they aren’t paid anything extra for giving up their holidays. As a result, the prospect of two days in a coach to Andorra isn’t very appealing. One school that used to bring 50 kids to the same event as us, didn’t attend this year because there weren’t enough staff to run it.

Someone else here got a “dirt cheap” 1 week in Jasper. Jealous for the children but not for the teachers, by Day 3-4 they will have to cope with a load of really crabby teenagers with major jet lag!
Our school is charging €1800 for a week in Sauze.

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Cant imagine being a teacher and taking x no. kids on a holiday and being responsible for them all for 7 days straight. Must be a nightmare.

Seem insane money, thought whole point school trips was to be a cheap/ mass trip that families could afford? thats no cheaper than per person going on a family trip and frankly I'd prob decide to save the money and go on a trip with the kid as a fam holiday.

Can I ask, are these private schools or does this happen in state as well? Would seem a huge rub in the face in state schools if offering such expensive trips while knowing the schools budgets are insanely stretched and theres plenty of kids in the school with struggling families?

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Ours is private.

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I think the teachers probably do get some nice down time as ski school is included in the price! I don’t think it’s necessarily expensive given how expensive skiing is now plus you get the childcare but I can’t help thinking the money would be better spent on our own family holiday… but of course we aren’t as cool as appealing as other friends!!

You know it makes sense.

@snowdave, yep, thats very true, school trips with friends are certainly a coming of age/ beginning of their independence phase I guess.

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I think that a half term week on full board with lessons every day and return transport is reasonable value at £1500.... Our kids weren't very interested because there wasn't much opportunity for free skiing outside of lessons. It's one of the few holidays they actually want to come on these days!

A snowHead

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Yes that’s fair enough, I have no gripe with the teachers…I certainly wouldn’t choose that responsibility!

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@noodlehat, +1

i have always bulked at the cost (and the various location choices, canada and verbier!!) of my 2 daughters school ski trip as well, though to be fair my girls have never been that bothered about going on them, as we have always tended to go on ski trips with families that they are friends with from school anyway.

but £2200 for what would be probably 5days skiing is nuts

i have a trip to val thorens at easter booked for the 3 of us for £2000, including travel, apartment and lift passes.

my girls secondary school ski trip is always over subscribed, and is generally "staffed" by the same people year on year.
though to be fair it is situated in a fairly middle class location.

when my (now) ex wife first started teaching, over 20 years ago now, the school she taught in located in a prosperous area went to the same resort (werfen, austria) year after year, stayed in the same hotel, and her head of department had organised the trips for over a decade.

she was invited to go on one of the trips (as he knew, like me, she was an ex seasonaire), and i was invited along as well, as i had became friends with him and we were both obsessed with skiing but i had to pay for my holiday.
i paid the same as the students and it was £550, all in including flights.

yes the teachers on the trip were working, and it was like herding cats every morning and afternoon getting the kids organised, i tended to have to show the same lad (he was the son of a well known 80's/90's England footballer) every day how to put his ski boots on and off each day!!
but we all had a good time, with lots of socialising with other adults from schools that were in the same resort

i have always thought that school ski trips would be good for pupils who want to try skiing for families have no interest in going, or cannot afford it as a family.
but personally do not understand why parents who ski would send their kids on an expensive jolly, but if they can afford it then that is their choice.
i just wonder if this has not exacerbated incidents of schools outdoing each other Puzzled

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I did a school trip to Norway in 1963 which cost £40 - about £700 now. I had just enough in the Post Office savings account my grandmother had set up for us when we were born and my parents said I could go if I chose to use that (they could not have afforded it given they would have had to have done similar for my siblings). I adored it - fell in love with skiing but couldn't afford to go again for many years. But it was basic, I suppose, compared to what today's kids demand. We stayed in a youth hostel in Geilo, in big dormitories with communal showers. Food was OK. Can't remember what we did in the evenings but it didn't involve outings and bright lights and I don't suppose there was any TV. We went to Bergen by boat and then train to Geilo. Incredibly exciting.

My son in law, a PE teacher, learnt to ski on school trips - he did ski school with the kids and made very rapid progress because he paid attention! Moved around from group to group to read the riot act if necessary to the kids mucking around. He did quite a few trips when he was single, but they were hard work - the last ones were coach to Italy - vomitting and delays the order of the day. And, these days, pages and pages of risk assessments, prowling corridors at night and confiscating alcohol. The evenings were the hardest work. Always one really homesick and "left out" child needing a lot of pastoral care. He wouldn't do it now; the holiday time with his own kids is precious. Anyone who thinks these trips are a free "jolly" for the teachers just doesn't have a clue.

In his schools (state) they always gave priority to kids who had never been skiing.

In our school (top grammar school in Cardiff - not that many very poor kids) practically nobody had been skiing, back in the day, of course. We had a motley collection of ski gear. My mother knitted me a lovely fair isle "Norwegian" sweater in oiled wool but it was April and very warm. The first lesson was on the flat outside the hostel and there's a photo somewhere of us all in short-sleeved T shirts.

I have a friend who taught languages and took endless trips to Germany and France. Very hard work, and there are few trips these days because of all the "safeguarding". She recalls one trip she did, as a pupil in sixth form, where a group of them were sent off to spend two weeks, on their own, with families in Paris. Had all those families been "vetted"? You can bet not. She kept in touch with the woman she stayed with for many years - said she was very understanding, and let her go off into Paris on her own in the afternoons after the compulsory morning school. That wouldn't be allowed now. My son in law, a few years ago, was planning a kayaking trip to France but it had to be called off after one set of parents insisted that their nightmare daughter be included. This was a child who sometimes ran away from school. In Hove the police knew her, and the staff got to know how to find her, but it was always a top level panic. Imagine that on a kayaking expedition? A child who would not follow orders and would light off if she felt offended. After much consultation with local authority, head teacher, etc, the trip was called off.

One reason trips are so much more expensive these days (apart from the little darlings demanding en suite bathrooms) is probably that a lot of teachers are needed to guarantee the 24/7 surveillance which the "safeguarding" demands. And the rules will demand that no child is ever alone with one teacher..... so prowling the corridors is in pairs, like policemen on the beat.

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Ours looks like it is about £1400 this year to somewhere in Austria. My son’s only just joined so hoping he gets to go next year but apparently it is oversubscribed usually. It’s a state school.
As an only child I am keen for him to have the opportunity to go and have a ball with his mates rather than have to ski with me, and my really slow husband. I still remember my school ski trip with very fond memories. A few of his mates at school can ski so if they all get on they should have a nice group of intermediate/advanced skiers.

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£1750 for our 13yrs old - a week of racing and training at Le Meuniers in mid December. The cost covered everything - flights, race gear hire, racing and training. Stayed in a decent hotel by the looks of it…

After all it is free

Our school ski trip is priced at £1,379 to Nassfield Austria in Feb half term - 60 places.

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I think one of the big attractions for America and I suspect Canada as well is that it is much harder to buy alcohol underage than in Europe.
Our children didn't go to school where they had ski trips, a friend who is a teacher who has been on them says they are very hard work.

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It was his older cousin who had led him astray and discovered the bangers - he had grown up blowing up cow pats in Normandy. Foreign travel is SO culturally stimulating.

You know it makes sense.

@reh_stuff, were the kids allowed to go bombing round unsupervised? I can see that would have been fun!

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£1165, group of 30, flying to Bormio first week of Feb.

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@reh_stuff, i understand that, and stated if parents want to do that (and can afford to), then it is up to them.

my point was that, i am sure that school ski trips could be made more accessible to less well off kids, if the organisers stuck to smaller/cheaper resorts in Europe, instead of going higher/posher/further afield then the year before or neighbouring school.

as i mentioned, i accompanied my ex's school ski trip twenty years ago, and i saw that the kids had a great time, and so did the teachers (and me) albeit working hard as well.
but, the organiser of the trip kept going to a relatively cheap resort in Austria year on year.
Because, they he knew what they were going to get for their money, and familiarly to the area, and him being able to speak German made life easier.

i understand that you could get a school trip for £550 now, but i am sure it could be nearer £1k per student, as generally most trips to Europe are via coach.

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@NickYoung, that sounds a lot better than £2200

with regards to the kids skiing, even when i went on the wifes ski trip, the kids were not allowed to ski unsupervised, though their lessons lasted all day long with a 2 hour lunch break, which the teachers supervised, all included in the cost

i believe that stopped years ago due to insurance reasons after a schoolkid on a ski trip had a serious injury off piste.

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Lad 3 went to Jasper--a popular destination for private school trips--last season for £1,895, 5 days skiing and 48 hours in transit. I thought it was silly, but the kids seemed to have a good time (Lad 3 was especially well pleased to have been put in the top group). Agree the alcohol thing was a key determinant. Lad 2 is off to a ski-touring trip in France this coming Easter break for c. £1,800; but with that much uphill earning of one's turns, I suspect they'll be too knackered to get into too much trouble.

I've been a parent "volunteer" on prep school ski trips before (essentially we dads got to ski on our own, and met up with the kids at lunch), you could not pay me enough to have been one of the teachers.

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£845 for five days skiing in Crans Montana - though that was Feb ‘22. My kids went to the local Comp, and the trips are always kept low price, to make them as accessible as possible. That’s was flying too - previous ones had been by coach, eg to Torgon in the PDS.

As others have said, the skiing itself is almost secondary to the experience and what they get from these chances for independence. All mine got their etoile d’ors years ago, but were happy helping their friends in the lessons, and just generally hanging out and having fun.

And as to the safeguarding - definitely times have changed from my school trips - memories of us 14 year olds drinking beer in Innsbruch while the PE/geography teachers barely bothered to look the other way.

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I think these days parents can be better informed via the internet.
Dummy flight book, looking at lift pass price, etc.
None of that was available for a week in soll for £350ish in the late 80s!!!! (Fezz up - that was bus & boat…. & lost lots of pieces of fruit playing card games… even if fruit had a fixed promise to pay price to loses)
Good times Very Happy

+ little things - full area lift pass, restricted lift pass, etc.

After all it is free

I think a lot of state schools have stopped doing ski trips because of the extensive risk assessments involved and actually getting teachers, even keen skiers, to volunteer. I don't blame them - such a high risk activity is too worrying especially if you are the party leader. I know that's a pity but that's how it is now. My (now adult) children's state school didn't do them (we took them ourselves). Being able to afford £2200 for just one child is another world for me!

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Our local state secondary also doing Canada for about the same (£2k+)

Cant argue about snow / booze but thats half what it costs for our family trip to AUT so hardly value.

Help!!

School ski trip cost

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