Field Trips: More Than A Day Off

Since elementary school we have had a problem with minimal amounts of field trips. And against the beliefs of some teachers and adults, students don’t just want field trips for the sake of having fun, but for the experience that it provides them. Students reading about experiences in books does nothing for them and it doesn’t truly expose them to what they need to be exposed to. When students are put into situations that they may not have usually been in, it gives them the chance to learn new things. Going on different trips also allows students to be exposed to different cultures. This is extremely important especially in a place such as Brunswick which is more isolated than other schools in the county.

Going on field trips also preps the students to be out in the world on their own. It gives them the chance to navigate real world situations that they might find themselves in. It also gives them the chance to meet different people and see different lifestyles they wouldn’t see where they originally come from.

Personally, the most important and impactful field trip I had gone on was a field trip I went on in the 9th grade to the Holocaust Museum. The issue with this is that it was at a different school that I went on this field trip and since transferring to Brunswick an opportunity to go on a field trip has not occurred. The issue causing the lack of field trips is not that teachers don’t want to go on them, rather they don’t have the funding or support to do so. So, what ends up happening is that teachers are forced to charge exorbitant amounts of money from their students and because this is not ideal, no field trip ever happens.

Overall, Brunswick needs to invest in more field trips especially in subjects like history and different sciences where it’s better to get hands on experience and see things in person rather than in books and online. Students would be able to learn and link the facts they learn with the real-life experiences they had.