Princeton schools to ease field-trip limits

District officials will keep abreast of the news and some trips may be called off.

By: Jeff Milgram
   The Princeton Regional School District will relax the ban on field trips to metropolitan areas it instituted after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, Superintendent Claire Sheff Kohn said Monday.
   "We’re going to try to loosen the ban," she said.
   But district officials will keep abreast of the news and some trips may be called off, Dr. Kohn said.
   "With regard to longer field trips, we’ll allow planning to go forward with the understanding that international events may require that trips be canceled," Dr. Kohn said.
   The first test of this relaxation of the ban will come tonight, when the Princeton Regional Board of Education is scheduled to vote to allow 40 members of the Princeton High School baseball team to go to Cocoa, Fla., March 23-30. The Baseball Booster Club is paying for the trip.
   She said the district will not bear the financial burden if trips fall through or if travel-related businesses fail.
   These trips will have to have a "sufficient number of staff members" as chaperones and the district will not coerce anyone to go on a trip, Dr. Kohn said.
   In October, the district canceled a trip to Philadelphia by Littlebrook School students and a field trip to the State House in Trenton by Riverside School students.
   Last month the district introduced a change to its field trip policy. The change offers general guidelines on field trips, which were controversial even before Sept. 11.
   Long trips that involve large groups of students, such as last year’s tour of St. Petersburg, Russia, and Berlin by the Princeton High School Choir, disrupt classwork because teachers slow down their lessons so those students making the trip do not fall behind. Extended field trips also come in conflict with interscholastic sporting events.
   "How do we balance the competing priorities, the wonderful experience of these trips with the academic programs that sometimes get put on hold, and the athletic competitions?" Dr. Kohn asked last month.
   "Basically, the new policy is to reinforce the importance of good scheduling, to reinforce the importance of continuity of instruction," Assistant Superintendent Jeffrey Graber said last month.
   Other upcoming extended trips include a European tour by the PHS Orchestra and a trip to Washington by John Witherspoon Middle School students.