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Unread 10-04-2006, 10:42
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Quote:
Originally Posted by dlavery
"Appropriate precautions" may include: ankle shackles to keep everyone in their assigned seats, blindfolds, heavy sedation, muzzles, forcing everyone to listen to Anne Murray recordings, and confiscation of all lemon jello (don't ask).
Dave, you're forgetting ball gags and/or good ol' duct tape and socks. That will ensure quiet

I let me kids know that we will have space on the bottom of the bus available as a "time out area". Plus, we advised them to wait until the ride home to annoy us since they are going to be ours to abuse for 3 days and why make the advisors grumpier then needed.
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Unread 10-04-2006, 10:55
Freddy Schurr Freddy Schurr is offline
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

1. Roll call every time you leave and enter the bus.
2. Quiet-time at designated time.
3. BJs is a good idea, stock up on food and water.
4. Also, check medical information on each student. Some students may need to use the rest-room every so often or have to step out of the bus for some time.
5. You are going to need a lot of entertainment for the trip. Hand-held games or actually team-building games work out best for this.
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Unread 10-04-2006, 10:56
David55 David55 is offline
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Quote:
Originally Posted by dlavery
Heh heh, yeah, things might be a little different in Israel. Let me just say that based on the stuff I tried to get away with while I was in high school, it is reasonable to expect that appropriate precautions should be taken with the current generation of students. "Appropriate precautions" may include: ankle shackles to keep everyone in their assigned seats, blindfolds, heavy sedation, muzzles, forcing everyone to listen to Anne Murray recordings, and confiscation of all lemon jello (don't ask).

Realistically, go with gender-based sectioning of the bus during the sleep periods, PG-rated movies or even PG-13 movies (if the parents are OK with it), and enough planned stops to let everyone stretch their legs and avoid cabin fever, and you should be fine. Finding enough G-rated movies that are reasonable and entertaining for that long may be tough - remember, you have to watch them too (after all, how many times can you watch "Barney Goes To Camp"?)! For those that will have iPods, GameBoys, or laptop computers (OK, who doesn't?), batteries will be an issue. A while back, Team 180 posted a great idea - wire up a few robot batteries to an inverter and use them to provide power to all the electronic toys on the bus. Tytus did something similar to power his X-box. Definitely something to think about!

-dave
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There is nothing they can do on a bus that they can't do when they are free in the WGCC.

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Unread 10-04-2006, 11:11
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Considering that our bus rides to Atlanta have been at least 24 hours, a lot of movies, snacks, sleep, and then self-entertainment between the students. There is always things to do to pass the time, believe me.

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Unread 10-04-2006, 11:16
sanddrag sanddrag is offline
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Are we the only team that does homework on the bus? And our ride (to phoenix) is only 7 hours.
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Unread 10-04-2006, 11:18
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Though I don't agree with every aspect of your plan, I respect your reasons for following it. Allow me to make a couple of modifications as to how I would respond if I was a student in this situation.

Before I even go into specifics, I suggest you have (if you haven't arranged one already, you seem very prepared) a meeting to cover this all in detail. Even if students signed a contract, they may "forget" at this point.

I. Bus curfew / gender separation
Make sure this is understood beforehand to avoid conflicts. Choose a policy and stick with it. Instead of saying "we're going to have to all move around at dark" try and word it like this:

"OK, everyone, we'll have a pit stop before dark, and when we get back on the bus please sit "such-and-such"." That way, everyone leaves the bus, and they get back on and have to choose a new spot. It's a more concrete change than trying to move everybody at some arbitrary point. You avoid excuses like "it's not dark yet!" (I have heard this one, trust me) in favor of being able to say that "we agreed to move after the 9 o'clock pit stop".

A female and male section is probably unnecessary. You as a mentor know who your trouble makers are - most students won't really misbehave, they'll just want to sleep or chat casually.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew Schuetze
Howdy all and NEMO types,

I'd appreciate some suggestions in regards to curfew and such for 18 hour bus rides. This year's trip to Atlanta will be via bus and will be 18 hours in transit. My thoughts are to treat it like a hotel situation and have a 'curfew' at XX:xx PM with seat checks. At curfew each set of seats will be same sex. I'm even thinking that I need to section off the bus a bit and have a female and male section???

What kinds of meals do you typically serve en route? We are leaving @ 7:00 PM so I am asking students to have eaten dinner before boarding and then having snacks for them in the evening. My plan is to then have breakfast items for the AM, Sam's club stuff. We would then stop at a pizza buffet somewhere for lunch and then do dinner in Atlanta.

Besides having a collection of G and PG movies, do you provide any other type of entertainment/amusement? Are there standard bus games that teams play?

Any comments and suggestions are more than appreciated,


Thanks,
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Unread 10-04-2006, 11:18
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

The longest bus trip my old team took was to the UTC regional when they held it in New Haven. However I did do a bus trip from NH to VA, and I do know what to do on bus trips and what not to do. Honestly, I think bus rules are kind of silly, and I agree with David; luckily our engineers and mentors were really laid back, and since we felt relaxed none of us "took advantage" of our freedom. To whomever said, give respect, get respect...I couldn't agree more. To the NEM's and parents who run teams, if you find bus trips or whatnot to be intolerable because of attitudes or emotions, try giving your kids some freedom, you'd be suprised how well it works.
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Unread 10-04-2006, 11:19
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Quote:
Originally Posted by sanddrag
Are we the only team that does homework on the bus? And our ride (to phoenix) is only 7 hours.
Our students often take their homework with them and work on it in their hotel rooms. The bus can be a distracting and uncomfortable study environment.
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Unread 10-04-2006, 11:26
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

If you cant come up with good movies then Tivo John Steward or other entertaining TV programs before you leave

make sure you tell the students "dont watch John Steward this week..."
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Unread 10-04-2006, 11:36
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Quote:
Originally Posted by David55
Dave
There is nothing they can do on a bus that they can't do when they are free in the WGCC.

David
Trust me, there are MANY things that can happen on a bus that would not be a concern at WGCC. And when it happens on a bus that is traveling across state lines, it then becomes a federal, rather than state, issue.

-dave
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Unread 10-04-2006, 11:49
David55 David55 is offline
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Quote:
Originally Posted by dlavery
Trust me, there are MANY things that can happen on a bus that would not be a concern at WGCC. And when it happens on a bus that is traveling across state lines, it then becomes a federal, rather than state, issue.

-dave
You're probably right in some situations...

But I still think that in most cases it is really unnecessary to have same sex seating in a bus (Hotel rooms I can understand, but not buses). Correct me if I'm wrong, but boys and girls talking is not a crime (yet).

David
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Unread 10-04-2006, 12:22
Rick TYler Rick TYler is offline
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Quote:
Originally Posted by David55
Curfew, seat checks?? it's not like your in a 700 room hotel, your in a bus!
Either:

1. Kids have changed a lot since I was in high school back in the Pleistocene.

(or)

2. David55 doesn't have as much imagination as we used to when I was in high school.

I think seat checks are a great idea.

... and... if you want to show any movies rated PG13 or higher, I'd get a signed permission slip from all the parents of the students on the bus. You DO NOT want to have to deal with a parent who thinks their parenting decisions have been overridden.

Good luck. I'd rather do my taxes than spend 18 hours on a bus.
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Unread 10-04-2006, 12:43
Pat McCarthy Pat McCarthy is offline
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

The last two years and this year, 67 has taken a coach bus down to ATL. It is about a 14 hour ride for us. This is how we have run things:

We don't do a gender-based seating system. Our mentors keep a close eye on us. We've got a pretty effective punishment system to deter most wrong doing.

We leave at Midnight on Tuesday so we get to ATL about 2PM on Wednesday.
I usually throw a pre-massively-long-bus-ride party at my house up until 11pm or so on Tuesday to get the kids tired out a bit so they won't want to stay up all that long once they are on the bus.
There really isn't a set time to go to sleep, but usually quite quickly the lights are turned out and a quiet time is in effect until 6 or 7am.

Our bus makes a dead of night (about 2am) stop in Cincinnati Ohio for a driver swap. This gives people (who are crazy, mind you) a chance to get up and run around the bus a few laps.

We'll then stop for breakfast at a McDonald's or something in Kentucky or Tennessee about 8am. After breakfast everyone is usually awake and needs stuff to keep them occupied. People bring lots of personal electronic goodies for this purpose. iPods, laptops, portable DVD players, books , and homework. However, for entertaining everyone else, we encourage everyone to bring movies on DVD or :gasp: VHS.

The ratings on these have really not been much of an issue in most cases. We've watched: The Incredibles, The Blues Brothers, Ladder 49, Young Frankenstein, Blazing Saddles, The "Rejected" animation DVD, episodes of 'Family Guy', The Notebook (which the girls forced upon the guys after the argument against), and Anchorman. Probably a few others that I forgot.

*tangent* I think that the hardest one to pitch was Anchorman, because the DVD said it was unrated, but among the students we had a laptop and a cell phone, got online to IMDB.com, looked up the movie and found that it was just the extras that were unrated.*/tangent*
Anyway, lunch is another fast food restaurant, we try for a KFC in Kentucky.

In the past, we stayed in ATL Saturday night as well, and left Sunday for the trip home. Which got us home around 9pm. This year, we're saving some $$ and leaving Saturday night. This should make it a similar trip to the way down. Historically, the ride back is less energetic and more homework filled.
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Last edited by Pat McCarthy : 10-04-2006 at 12:47.
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Unread 10-04-2006, 12:49
sanddrag sanddrag is offline
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

Quote:
Originally Posted by Pat McCarthy
We've watched: ... Blazing Saddles
Oh my. Funny movie though.
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Unread 10-04-2006, 13:41
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Re: Suggestions for 18 hour bus trip

It doesn't look like it's been mentioned yet, I'd highly recommend "Apollo 13".

Scott
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