Teachers and spouses of teachers unite!

[tntstults]

Let's rally for a teacher discount on cruises! My husband is a teacher and the only months he could go on a 4 night, 5 night, or 7 night cruise is in the most expensive months. We are limited to June, July, half of August, spring break and the week between Christmas and New Years. During the school year he can only take 3 days vacation and cannot schedule those days next to a holiday or day already scheduled off. This leaves us with the most expensive times to cruise I reached out to Disney to suggest a teacher discount. Does anyone else want to join me and reach out to Disney as well?

 

[pearljammer]

I

Let's rally for a teacher discount on cruises! My husband is a teacher and the only months he could go on a 4 night, 5 night, or 7 night cruise is in the most expensive months. We are limited to June, July, half of August, spring break and the week between Christmas and New Years. During the school year he can only take 3 days vacation and cannot schedule those days next to a holiday or day already scheduled off. This leaves us with the most expensive times to cruise I reached out to Disney to suggest a teacher discount. Does anyone else want to join me and reach out to Disney as well?

How bout parent discounts too? Same reasons. School.

Notice prices are higher during school break times, so….. just saying. They know what they are doing.

Not to mention if there are year round sports. The list goes on. Then there’s the money honey, who doesn’t want a discount? We all have reasons. This is just one.

 

[CamColt]

Can we include Lunch Ladies with that?

 

[tntstults]

Can we include Lunch Ladies with that?

Why of course! You count too!

 

[llachance]

DCL is very limited on their discounts. Since the ships sail full, most of the time, I don't see that changing. I am sorry that the time you can sail is limited, and at a higher price (supply and demand control that) and hope that in the future that if becomes more affordable for everyone that wants to sail.

 

[Lucien Franciosa]

I sympathize for your cause, and do think some modest discounts would be reasonable for teachers. Not so sure about for parents in general. I have yet to be on a Disney Cruise even while school was in session where kids were not well represented. No doubt the percentages vary, but there are always a lot of children present.

But there is another issue, supply and demand. The bottom line is the demand is high because there are more people looking to cruise, lower the costs, the demand will go even higher. We can debate occupancy (and have) but there just isn't that much empty space (percentage wise) left. So if price is lowered, demand goes higher, and some people will be disappointed at the decreased opportunity to cruise available to them.

 

[Lucien Franciosa]

btw, I know its not analogous, but it would be good PR for DCL to offer discounts. Another premium company, Apple, gets some mileage from their education discounts. But unfortunately, people not related to education are taking advantage of them because Apple no longer asks for proof (privacy issues I believe). I see some people rationalizing using Apple's 10% off (or whatever it is, floats with the product) when they aren't in education by saying Apple's prices are too high to start Just saying it's a good idea, but gets complicated fast.

 

[tvguy]

I

How bout parent discounts too? Same reasons. School.

Notice prices are higher during school break times, so….. just saying. They know what they are doing.

Not to mention if there are year round sports. The list goes on. Then there’s the money honey, who doesn’t want a discount? We all have reasons. This is just one.

Exactly. My kids are grown and I am retired, but in my working years with kids at home I was limited to school vacation weeks, except the month of July no vacations were allowed.

@tntstults As a teacher, I would ask you how you feel about one of the more controversial topics on the DIS Boards, taking kids out of school for a vacation to save money? That is, if your school allows it. My kids private high school phased out allowing kids to take vacation during the school year, well, they could take the time off, but teachers could not longer let them get credit for work they missed, could not give them work to do, and could not allow make up tests.

 

[tntstults]

Exactly. My kids are grown and I am retired, but in my working years with kids at home I was limited to school vacation weeks, except the month of July no vacations were allowed.

@tntstults As a teacher, I would ask you how you feel about one of the more controversial topics on the DIS Boards, taking kids out of school for a vacation to save money? That is, if your school allows it. My kids private high school phased out allowing kids to take vacation during the school year, well, they could take the time off, but teachers could not longer let them get credit for work they missed, could not give them work to do, and could not allow make up tests.

I actually am not the teacher, my husband is. I can speak as a mom of teenagers. The workload in middle school and high school would be ALOT to make up or try to do in advance to validate being pulled out of school for a week. But knowing my kids, they would do whatever it takes to get back on the Disney cruise ship! I think rules like you mention are a little extreme. It should be up to the family to make those decisions in my opinion.

 

[tlprice]

As a teacher I do get a couple of discounts on things, but they use id.me to verify that I am a teacher. It would be nice to have a cruise teacher discount. There are hotels that do.
Even as a teacher, I have taken my daughter out of school for trips because it is the only time that trip is available or affordable. In elementary school I took her out one week each year. She was a good student and her teachers didn't care. In middle school I only took her out once (in 7th grade). I'm so glad I did because that ended up being the Covid year and we didn't get any vacations for quite a while. In high school, I have only taken her out once and she only missed 4 days because it was during Labor Day week so there was already a day off of school. She is also on a block schedule so she actually only missed 2 days of each class. She had super hard classes and still finished the semester with straight A's so I don't think it negatively affected her. As a teacher, I find that my students that travel are usually much better students because they have more experiences and viewpoints that help them make connections that can't be learned in a classroom.

 

[obsesseddisneyfan]

Supply and demand. Glad they are making more supply. Hopefully prices will come down, or at least stay the same.

 

[Cheburashka]

DCL is very limited on their discounts. Since the ships sail full, most of the time, I don't see that changing. I am sorry that the time you can sail is limited, and at a higher price (supply and demand control that) and hope that in the future that if becomes more affordable for everyone that wants to sail.

There are actually quite a lot of discounts. Florida resident discounts, military discounts, cast member discounts, and GT discounts are common on DCL. Not to mention the 10% placeholder discount that anyone who books a cruise onboard can get.

 

[Cfabar1]

A few months ago I referenced the "teacher tax" on these boards for DCL, which is essentially what it is. The summer sailings are not affordable for teachers. In our area, average teacher pay is somewhere around 60k, and they are the only time many teachers would be able to go on a disney sailing because of what you outline above.

I think an educator discount is unlikely to happen until Disney feels they need it. Right now the ships are full, so they don't.

 

[lanejudy]

There are a LOT of families (I would venture to say most families) who do not pull their children out of school and thus only travel during school vacation periods. It's supply and demand, more people wanting to travel makes it more expensive at those times. DCL isn't the only vendor raising rates at such times, look at airfare, hotels, water parks, theme parks, and various others.

I'd be highly surprised if DCL ever offered a teacher's discount. To my knowledge WDW never has (though Swolphin offers one). There are a lot of professions that could be recognized with a discount -- a common question is whether there are discounts for emergency responders and/or medical providers, veterans (not retired), etc. None of those groups are "unworthy" but it's a slippery slope once a business starts offering discounts based on profession/job.

 

[Lucien Franciosa]

There are actually quite a lot of discounts. Florida resident discounts, military discounts, cast member discounts, and GT discounts are common on DCL. Not to mention the 10% placeholder discount that anyone who books a cruise onboard can get.

True, but those are extremely specific discounts to set groups of people (like the OP's proposal), and are not available to most. But go to most other major cruise lines and you are offered discounts on all sailings for simply breathing. Which, statistically speaking, all people booking a cruise do. And they plaster it across the front of their web page making it impossible to miss, whereas with Disney you have to go searching for it. Right now Royal Caribbean has 'buzzer beaters,' Carnival has 'fun in the sun', etc. So I think it's fair to say Disney's approach to discounts is different from most other cruise lines. I haven't tracked the other cruise lines enough to know if they follow the same overall pattern in pricing such that the by product is its higher when teachers have time to cruise.

 

[tvguy]

. In our area, average teacher pay is somewhere around 60k, and they are the only time many teachers would be able to go on a disney sailing because of what you outline above.

More than I ever made, and I found a way to pay for a Disney cruise.

 

[justafigment27]

My advice is to not look at prices during times when you can’t travel. It’s just an exercise in frustration.

 

[pachy25]

Why not a retiree discount, fast food worker discount, retail sales clerk discount, grocery bagger discount, law enforcement discount, high school dropout discount, illegal alien discount?

 

[Lucien Franciosa]

Why not a retiree discount, fast food worker discount, retail sales clerk discount, grocery bagger discount, law enforcement discount, high school dropout discount, illegal alien discount?

I think the impetus to this suggestion is that teachers are not free to travel year round and hence can not pick their timing for the cheapest cruises as could fast food workers, retail sales clerks, grocery baggers, law enforcement, high school dropouts, illegal aliens, and snarky forum posters. Teachers can only easily cruise during peak holiday demand times.

 

[pachy25]

I think the impetus to this suggestion is that teachers are not free to travel year round and hence can not pick their timing for the cheapest cruises as could fast food workers, retail sales clerks, grocery baggers, law enforcement, high school dropouts, illegal aliens, and snarky forum posters. Teachers can only easily cruise during peak holiday dem

I think the impetus to this suggestion is that teachers are not free to travel year round and hence can not pick their timing for the cheapest cruises as could fast food workers, retail sales clerks, grocery baggers, law enforcement, high school dropouts, illegal aliens, and snarky forum posters. Teachers can only easily cruise during peak holiday demand times.

I
Then save your money like most of us did, or go on a cheaper cruise line. Easy fix