[MissInformation]

I would like to suggest the Bagel System. But to do so, I would have to explain the Bagel System:

An over-exuberant parent got some bagel stores to donate their day old bagels to our team for our bus trips to Richmond and Georgia. And by "some" I mean 3 big trash bags full of bagels. Richmond proved that we would have an obscene amount of bagels left over, most of which were thrown out. Now, at the end of Peachtree, we still had way too many bagels, so the teacher chaperon and I came up with The Ence-Foster Bagel System, which went like this:

Foul words- must eat two old bagels.
Horseplay (shoving, hitting, pushing, biting, pulling hair, etc)- must eat four old bagels.
Questioning the Bagel System- must eat two old bagels
Questioning why you can't question the Bagel System- must eat 4 old bagels
Having no pants on- must eat 100 old bagels.

Now, that's the only rules we dealt with because, despite what Dave said, we did not separate the team by gender and did not call a curfew and we've been known to slip in a few PG-13 movies (wooooo!). However, you can create bagel penalties for any rule you create. The Bagel System was really popular (believe me, when we stopped for dinner, I barely got to eat because I had to keep answering questions about it, such as what words constitute a foul word, every time I tried to take a bite, I would hear "Hey Heidi, does #$@ count?") I will admit now, that the Bagel System was corrupt. People were encouraged to tell on their peers, which they did, and we even had a double-crossing stoolie in their midst who got benefits for his miscreant ways. But overall, the Bagel System did more good than bad, and we had some sweet-talking, non-violent behavior on the way home, because, believe me, nobody wanted to have to eat bagels that had been sitting in the storage area under a bus for 3 days... "New diesel flavored bagels, yum!"

The Bagel System aside, my other recommendation is to make sure that all of the kids will eat pizza and if not, try to find a area that has several fast food places to stop at so that they can have some choices (we have very picky eaters and there tended to be big battles over dinner places). Oh, and try to encourage the buddy system at rest stops as rest stops can often be high crime areas with a lot of strangers coming and going, and you know, the world still has way too many sick people in it. Doing a seat check is a good idea, but I recommend doing the check by names, not numbers because it's easy to miscount. Oh, and one last thing, take extra trashbags and make sure the students (and adults) clean up after themselves!)

Heidi