School trips can be the highlight of the academic year for students, and whilst they can be a lot of fun for teachers and school staff too, the work they put in the background is tiring and time-consuming. To ensure your whole school gets an enjoyable and memorable experience, we’ve compiled a series of blogs to help you facilitate your processes so that planning is not as stressful as it normally is.  

#1 How to market your school trip 

Before you even start booking all the elements of your school trip, such as transportation and accommodation, you should get the word out about your upcoming trip. Clear communication is the best tip that guarantees engagement, and it will make it easier for you to have rough number to consider when asking around for quotes and booking the services you need.  

Register interest 

We always recommend sending out a form well in advance that would act as a register of interest. This way, parents and guardians can let your school know whether or not they’d like their children to participate. For example, if you’d like to go to a museum and 52 people have registered their interest, the museum staff can give you an approximate cost bracket. Remember these numbers aren’t final, they are just for you to use as guidance.  When you have finalised the details of your trip, families’ circumstances may have changed.  

Gather all relevant information 

Before you announce the trip details and ask parents and guardians to make payment, make sure you have all the relevant information. It’s important that you don’t miss anything out. Not only will this allow you to communicate this information to families all at once, it also will make them less likely to contact your school asking questions.   

Along with the dates and destination of your trip, a good idea would be to make families aware of the planned itinerary (including times of travel if you can), the location of the hotel or other accommodation, what you’d recommend the children to pack, and any information about meals. If you’re planning to take the pupils somewhere where food will be served, don’t forget to ask parents and guardians for any dietary requirements you should be aware of.  

Share your itinerary with families 

Once you’re confident about the plan and you have all the information you need, it’s time to send it off to parents and guardians. As it’s most likely going to be a lengthy announcement, we recommend sending out an email with attachments. Alternatively, publish your itinerary on your school website, and notify families by sending out a text message with a link to your webpage. These two methods are the way to go as you won’t struggle with a character limit and parents and guardians can always look back to your email or website multiple times as they’ll know where to find it.  

Send reminders 

Remember some parents and guardians can be very busy and sometimes forgetful. After you’ve sent out the announcement for your upcoming school trip, it’s a good idea to send one or two reminders just in case someone missed the first communication or forgot about it. If you send out a weekly newsletter, you can include a section on it dedicated to your trip.  

Stay tuned… 

Keep an eye out for part two of our School Trip Series where we will discuss how relying on a digital platform can be just as effective (if not more) than an extra admin staff member, and how it facilitates the process of school trip planning. Until then, discover more about our school website design services, and book a free consultation with our team for the perfect place to store information about your outdoor experience, gallery visit, educational visit to Paris… etc!