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guitarnan
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| Posted: Aug 05 2010 at 10:11pm | IP Logged
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Has anyone ever belonged to a co-op that existed only for field trip opportunities? How did this work out for your family?
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Nancy in MD. Mom of ds (24) & dd (18); 31-year Navy wife, move coordinator and keeper of home fires. Writer and dance mom.
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cathhomeschool
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Yep. It was great for us because at that time I wouldn't have done the field trips on my own. We toured some places that I would never have thought of visiting and that were able to open their doors to us because we were a group.
Our group usually consisted of 12 families (sometimes we had more or less). We met once a month and each mom took a turn planning one monthly field trip. When we had more families we had bonus trips, less families and we took the summer off. The field trips were supposed to be on the same Friday each month, within 30 minutes from "town" and free or inexpensive. If we couldn't take all ages, some moms stayed behind with the younger kids. One request was that each family try not to miss more than 2 field trips a year. That way there would be enough people to qualify as a "group" for any trip. In reality, since so many of the families participating were large, group size issues were always that we had too many for one tour so we often split up.
The group here is still going after 5 or 6 years. Families have come and gone.
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Janette (4 boys - 22, 21, 15, 14)
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folklaur
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I think this sounds like a neat idea.
There were a few things in Phx that were somewhat similar when I lived there, but weren't really co-op situations.
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Paula in MN
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I'm in one now that is arranged that way. There are about 100 families in the group, so when someone arranges a trip they send out an email to the group of all the details, and those wishing to attend reserve their place. It's worked out well for us.
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 Paula
A Catholic Harvest
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Lori
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Folklaur, I'm in Phoenix, and maybe this is what you were familiar with. There is a lady here who coordinates the field trips for a group of homeschoolers...it's not an official co-op, but she has done it for so long that she gets all the theatre groups, etc, to allow homeschoolers the same group rate that schools get for daytime performances of plays, symphonies, etc.
She puts out a calendar of dates and prices at the end of summer, handles all the payments of tickets, and is generally amazing. "Membership" is simply word of mouth.
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Lori
wife to Rob, momma to Michael (18), Mark (12), Eric (9), Thomas (8), and Tabitha (6)
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DominaCaeli
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This sounds like a really great system! I wonder if there's something like that in our area...
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Celeste
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Lori
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I found out about it by calling one of the theatres myself and asking if, as a homeschooling family, we would qualify to buy tickets at the school rate. The lady said they had a group minimum of 10 students, but suggested the name/phone number of the lady I mentioned above, who coordinates it all. So, perhaps if you checked with an individual venue and asked if there was a person who did that, it might be equally serendipitous!
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Lori
wife to Rob, momma to Michael (18), Mark (12), Eric (9), Thomas (8), and Tabitha (6)
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KC in TX
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We do that here. Our group is small but there are lots of children so we always qualify for group rates. When the gas prices were unbelievable we stuck closer to home, but we have traveled 1.5 hours away. Mostly, it's because there are not a lot of things to do near us. We do it the 3rd Friday of each month. On the first Friday, we do park days (usually only in the cooler months), and there's not much else going on on the 2nd and 4th Fridays.
It works out well and there's not a lot of pressure.
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KC,
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Mama to LB ('98)
Michaela ('01)
Emma ('03)
Jordan ('05)
And, my 2 angels, Rose ('08) and Mark ('09)
The Cabbage Patch
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MaryM
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We don't have a "Co-op" but field trips are one of the 3 events that our support group tries to do regularly each month (activity day, Mom's Night Out/meeting, field trip). I think a co-op set up specifically for that sounds like a great idea.
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Mary M. in Denver
Our Domestic Church
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: Field Trip-Only Co-op?
