Teachers

[Bcshur]

After still being in cruise depression from being off the ship for two weeks I just would like to know how some other teachers do it? My husband and I are both teachers so us cruising late August-early June is basically impossible. We have thought about long weekend cruises but the practacality of us flying to Florida (we're in PA) is just a bigger expense. We are both late 20's and kids aren't in the immediate future and we certainly want to do some more traveling but just find us having to pay peak prices in the summer to be a huge bummer! Anyone have any suggestions? I am just short of quitting my job and moving to Florida in order to have easy access to cruises! Haha.

 

Thank you advance!

[Bcshur]

Let me add another comment, life is too short right? Haha. I had an epiphany during our last cruise that sometimes the moments in life are more important than the showy cars, house, and jewelry. I'd rather travel and have a good time in life than have absolutely every single thing I want and a large bank account.

[orville99]

After still being in cruise depression from being off the ship for two weeks I just would like to know how some other teachers do it? My husband and I are both teachers so us cruising late August-early June is basically impossible. We have thought about long weekend cruises but the practacality of us flying to Florida (we're in PA) is just a bigger expense. We are both late 20's and kids aren't in the immediate future and we certainly want to do some more traveling but just find us having to pay peak prices in the summer to be a huge bummer! Anyone have any suggestions? I am just short of quitting my job and moving to Florida in order to have easy access to cruises! Haha.

 

Thank you advance!

 

 

We try to work our cruise schedule around natural breaks in the school year - spring break, Christmas/New Years. Typically we'll end up doing two 7-night cruises in the summer (one as soon as the school year ends, and a second just before it starts again), and two 4-5 nighters at spring break and New Years.

[Russ Lomas]

Everyone complains how teachers get paid so well and have their summers off. Unfortunately, they must travel at peak times and pay double or triple what others pay who can travel on any given week of the year. It is a fact of the job, and they have to live with it.

 

My wife and I both work in the education field and have found the March Break prices to be better than summer and Christmas Break times. The two weeks over the Christmas Break are the highest of the year. Summer is typically more than the March Break. By booking early for the March Break, you can find a reasonable rate. Also, be flexible with your flight plans. We have driven an extra few hours to an airport other than our local one and have paid 1/3rd of what the local airport was charging.

 

Another nice thing about traveling over the March Break is that it is at a time of the year when I feel kind of "burned out" and need time away from the job.

 

Another suggestion that may work in future years depending on your situation....although I do not know about maternity and paternity leaves in the USA...when my wife was on a maternity leave from work, I took a paternity leave for 2 weeks to spend time together as a family. My school board topped up my salary to 100% of my wages for those 2 weeks since my wife had served the 2 week waiting period for Unemployment insurance already. She lost 2 weeks of eligibility for her unemployment insurance because I used 2 of her weeks, but we were able to take the time together as a family. We flew to Florida during off-peak times for those 2 weeks and spent time together as a family for 1/4 of what we would have paid during regular "teacher holiday" periods. The same would work for picking up a cruise in non-prime seasons. You would be taking along your newborn with you, but that could be nice too. I know this could be years away for you, but keep it in mind for the future if it works with your local board of education leave policies.

[bbbearden]

We try to work our cruise schedule around natural breaks in the school year - spring break, Christmas/New Years. Typically we'll end up doing two 7-night cruises in the summer (one as soon as the school year ends, and a second just before it starts again), and two 4-5 nighters at spring break and New Years.

 

 

If you are going to book during Chrstmas or Spring Break, these are also very peak times. We have found that booking very early gets us the best price. We are booked NOS in March 2013, prices have jumped 5 times since we booked. Some argue for last minute bookings to save money, but this creates issues with airfare and cabin availability.

 

My wife is a teacher and we have the same mie restrictions.

[Bcshur]

Everyone complains how teachers get paid so well and have their summers off. Unfortunately, they must travel at peak times and pay double or triple what others pay who can travel on any given week of the year. It is a fact of the job, and they have to live with it.

 

My wife and I both work in the education field and have found the March Break prices to be better than summer and Christmas Break times. The two weeks over the Christmas Break are the highest of the year. Summer is typically more than the March Break. By booking early for the March Break, you can find a reasonable rate. Also, be flexible with your flight plans. We have driven an extra few hours to an airport other than our local one and have paid 1/3rd of what the local airport was charging.

 

Another nice thing about traveling over the March Break is that it is at a time of the year when I feel kind of "burned out" and need time away from the job.

 

Another suggestion that may work in future years depending on your situation....although I do not know about maternity and paternity leaves in the USA...when my wife was on a maternity leave from work, I took a paternity leave for 2 weeks to spend time together as a family. My school board topped up my salary to 100% of my wages for those 2 weeks since my wife had served the 2 week waiting period for Unemployment insurance already. She lost 2 weeks of eligibility for her unemployment insurance because I used 2 of her weeks, but we were able to take the time together as a family. We flew to Florida during off-peak times for those 2 weeks and spent time together as a family for 1/4 of what we would have paid during regular "teacher holiday" periods. The same would work for picking up a cruise in non-prime seasons. You would be taking along your newborn with you, but that could be nice too. I know this could be years away for you, but keep it in mind for the future if it works with your local board of education leave policies.

 

Makes sense! Thank you. Unfortunatley, our education system is much different here. When taking maternity leave, you are not paid. Even when taking a leave of absense or FML (family medical leave) you are not paid. My friend was adopting children from Russia so was traveling back and forth and wanted to use HER sick days and personal days so she wouldn't have to take an unpaid leave and they would not allow her. So your idea would not work for us, however I do appreciate your feedback! :)

[newbiecruiser09]

I also work in a school and with 2 kids (including a high schooler) we have to travel during school breaks. We have taken a few land vacations around teacher work days (with an added day off maybe) and have taken a cruise during spring break. Our upcoming cruise is the week after Christmas. We booked SUPER early (like over a year out) and got airfare as soon as the dates opened up. Cruise fare is now > $200 what we are paying and airfare is already DOUBLE what we paid. If you need to travel during the peak times, I say book early. If you can work a few days off around a scheduled holiday (Columbus, Presidents etc) or teacher workdays try that. We also got the RCI Visa before our first cruise. Use it (and pay it off) for everything. Takes a bit of the bite out of the cost.

[Trainman-2]

Florida needs good teachers!

 

You will not need a Snow Shovel in Florida and you will be close to the ports.

 

 

It sounds to me like it is time for you to move...

[Bcshur]

I also work in a school and with 2 kids (including a high schooler) we have to travel during school breaks. We have taken a few land vacations around teacher work days (with an added day off maybe) and have taken a cruise during spring break. Our upcoming cruise is the week after Christmas. We booked SUPER early (like over a year out) and got airfare as soon as the dates opened up. Cruise fare is now > $200 what we are paying and airfare is already DOUBLE what we paid. If you need to travel during the peak times, I say book early. If you can work a few days off around a scheduled holiday (Columbus, Presidents etc) or teacher workdays try that. We also got the RCI Visa before our first cruise. Use it (and pay it off) for everything. Takes a bit of the bite out of the cost.

 

Thanks! Thinking of surprising my husband with a Christmas-New Years cruise for his 30th, the issue is...he coaches wrestling (UGH) and typically has tourneys during that time (UGH UGH) so it may take a lot of convincing. But if I do it for 2014 (do a shorter one til then) it gives me convincing time and saving time!

 

Til then, I will dream of being back on a ship.

 

Thank you for everyone and your help!

[ocdcruisenut]

We are sailing out of Cape Liberty on a 5 day in a JS. I kept watching CC for news of price drops and got a great one on our 8/11 Bermuda cruise. In fact, I paid LESS than what a Balcony was going for right before final payment. It was better than flying to FL and paying for a hotel the night before and transportation to/from the port and airport. ;)

[newbiecruiser09]

Thanks! Thinking of surprising my husband with a Christmas-New Years cruise for his 30th, the issue is...he coaches wrestling (UGH) and typically has tourneys during that time (UGH UGH) so it may take a lot of convincing. But if I do it for 2014 (do a shorter one til then) it gives me convincing time and saving time!

 

Til then, I will dream of being back on a ship.

 

Thank you for everyone and your help!

 

Maybe they can do a tourney on one of the islands :D or it would be a great team building trip (although being with the team may not be what you want :eek:) Given enough lead time he may be able to not schedule while you are away or may have his Asst Coach take over for that one time. Good Luck and keep dreaming of being on board.

[Bcshur]

Florida needs good teachers!

 

You will not need a Snow Shovel in Florida and you will be close to the ports.

 

 

It sounds to me like it is time for you to move...

 

Haha! Love it! To be honest upon returning back here to Pa (in the midst of a hot and dry heat wave) I really was tempted!

 

Thanks for the laugh. I think I could get used to palm trees and sand! :)

[Bcshur]

Maybe they can do a tourney on one of the islands :D or it would be a great team building trip (although being with the team may not be what you want :eek:) Given enough lead time he may be able to not schedule while you are away or may have his Asst Coach take over for that one time. Good Luck and keep dreaming of being on board.

 

Hahahaha. CC'ers are great! Thanks! Or perhaps I could get him to not coach all together. However, that stipend is typically our vacation money.....

 

Haha!

 

Thanks for all the comments!

[Booking It]

Save, save, save! I am a teacher, and I have the same issues.

 

I prefer to do the out of sight, out of mind technique. I opened up an account at a different bank and cut up the debit card (so that we couldn't use it on a whim). I have money automatically transferred to that account from each check. We call it our "travel account". It is NOT our savings... we have that in our regular bank.

 

We build it up, book a trip, and use that cash without worrying about pinching pennies in our "regular" checking. It has worked tremendously well, and it helps lessen the blow for booking expensive trips during the peak travel seasons.

[orville99]

If you are going to book during Chrstmas or Spring Break, these are also very peak times. We have found that booking very early gets us the best price. We are booked NOS in March 2013, prices have jumped 5 times since we booked. Some argue for last minute bookings to save money, but this creates issues with airfare and cabin availability.

 

My wife is a teacher and we have the same mie restrictions.

 

True. We always book as soon as we know what the schedule looks like, and generally get a reasonable price. One benefit of the 5-night cruises is that sometimes you can sneak one in just before or just after the holidays when the prices are lower and still be within the school break calendar.

[orville99]

Hahahaha. CC'ers are great! Thanks! Or perhaps I could get him to not coach all together. However, that stipend is typically our vacation money.....

 

Haha!

 

Thanks for all the comments!

 

See if you can find a holiday tournament down in Florida. I used to bring our baseball team down from NY every spring break to compete in tournaments (we still had snow on the fields up there):)

[Booking It]

See if you can find a holiday tournament down in Florida. I used to bring our baseball team down from NY every spring break to compete in tournaments (we still had snow on the fields up there):)

That's why you need to avoid staying at the Embassy Suites!!! For our Allure trip, we stayed at the Embassy Suites that is very close to the pier in Ft. Lauderdale. I think that coaches have figured out that they can cram a ton of kids into one room and then get free breakfast in the morning to make the trip cheaper. I can say this as a fact because many of them would leave their curtains open at night and you can see that there are 8-10 kids staying in one room.

 

It really wasn't a huge deal during the day because they were playing in their tournaments, but breakfast in the morning was a complete ZOO because there were WAY more people having breakfast than there should have been (and they all wear their team shirts, so it's easy to spot who is who... there had to have been at least 5 teams staying there).

[toxicfairy]

arrrgh :mad: ! I am a teacher assistant in a special ed. school ( Autism to muliple handicapped). So I am not a teacher but I do the same work with thank God less paper work...well lots of data taking but no report cards or testing...lol. And also only a quarter of the pay. Teacher's in our school only make an average of 48,000. So not so high paying . As far as cruiseing in March we only have one day off and the first 2 days in April (with the weekend it is still only 5 days )so that wouldn't really work. Plus we live in South Jersey so we have to pay to fly into Florida.

So if we want to cruise it is late june threw August.

Guess if I want to have cheaper rates and be able to do a TA or even Southern Caribbean I'll just have to wait another 20 years :eek: .

[orville99]

That's why you need to avoid staying at the Embassy Suites!!! For our Allure trip, we stayed at the Embassy Suites that is very close to the pier in Ft. Lauderdale. I think that coaches have figured out that they can cram a ton of kids into one room and then get free breakfast in the morning to make the trip cheaper. I can say this as a fact because many of them would leave their curtains open at night and you can see that there are 8-10 kids staying in one room.

 

It really wasn't a huge deal during the day because they were playing in their tournaments, but breakfast in the morning was a complete ZOO because there were WAY more people having breakfast than there should have been (and they all wear their team shirts, so it's easy to spot who is who... there had to have been at least 5 teams staying there).

 

 

Yep, otherwise we wouldn't have been able to afford giving our teams the opportunity to get some high energy practice in under game conditions. (We usually only put four/room though:o)

[d4nigirl]

After still being in cruise depression from being off the ship for two weeks I just would like to know how some other teachers do it? My husband and I are both teachers so us cruising late August-early June is basically impossible. We have thought about long weekend cruises but the practacality of us flying to Florida (we're in PA) is just a bigger expense. We are both late 20's and kids aren't in the immediate future and we certainly want to do some more traveling but just find us having to pay peak prices in the summer to be a huge bummer! Anyone have any suggestions? I am just short of quitting my job and moving to Florida in order to have easy access to cruises! Haha.

 

Thank you advance!

 

My fiance and I are in the same boat (same ages as well). We're both teachers too. In fact I'm in a public school and he's in a private one, a lot of the time, our school breaks don't match up. We're usually stuck to cruising or mostly doing what we want in the summer. Sometimes he works a summer camp which even narrows down our availability even more to two weeks in August. It's tough because of the prices but to alleviate some of it, we book our cruises about a year in advance. We also look for longer holiday weekends to help with the "cabin fever." We're never really on "summer vacation" since we're always planning and such for the next year. Usually when we return from our cruise, we have to go in to work the next day to set up our classroom, it's almost shock or like being dunked into ice water unexpected! I put an insane amount of time into researching vacations for us if ours line up even if it ends up being a small weekend getaway to a nearby casino. It's tough.

Our honeymoon is next summer and it's going to be insanely tough to get back to a schedule after that. It's sad, but there are times when I include the class within the trip I take too. I show them pictures and talk about excursions and it helps me relive the trip as well.

[stellarcam]

Many lines are starting to give teacher discounts and I feel RCCL should follow suit for our dedicated teachers. :(

[Jim M]

I feel your pain!!! I was forced to cruise during President's Week which was the perfect time of year but cruise price was higher, loaded with kids and airfare was out of sight from NY. We did several summer cruises as well, airfare was less and if we booked a late August cruise prices were a little lower.

 

Now that I'm retired it is one of life's joys to cruise whenever we want!! However at your age I know you don't want to hear that!!

 

Have fun whenever you do decide to cruise!!!

[DHADEN]

I teach also, and we LOVE to cruise the week of Thanksgiving. It's the best time of the year to get away from the cold and into the warm Caribbean!!

 

If your school schedule gets you off for the whole week, you have to find itenineraries that will match the calender. Or you may have to take an extra day before or after... If you can swing that, it's a good answer.

 

We have also cruised when I'm off for Spring Break, but it's usually pretty crowded with a lot of kids.

 

Hope This Helps.

[Merion_Mom]

arrrgh :mad: ! I am a teacher assistant in a special ed. school ( Autism to muliple handicapped). So I am not a teacher but I do the same work with thank God less paper work...well lots of data taking but no report cards or testing...lol. And also only a quarter of the pay. Teacher's in our school only make an average of 48,000. So not so high paying . As far as cruiseing in March we only have one day off and the first 2 days in April (with the weekend it is still only 5 days )so that wouldn't really work. Plus we live in South Jersey so we have to pay to fly into Florida.

So if we want to cruise it is late june threw August.

 

Bayonne, NJ

 

Baltimore, MD

[read52]

I am a teacher but we only started cruising about 5 years ago (when we both turned 55). My husband had been sick for 1 1/2 years and we won airline tickets on our local tv station. We decided to take a cruise because we always wanted to try it. Then we were hooked. We have done mid June and the week after Easter because I teach in a Catholic school. One time we were told that the week of the 4th of July is slow because people want to stay with family. We have gone out of Baltimore 5 times because we are 45 minutes away from the port. We have gone out of New Jersey once. In 10 cruises, we have only paid to fly 3 times.