Open Mic

It's open mic so I just want to vent. At my school, whenever we (the teachers) want to do something, whether it's a field trip, fundraising opportunity, "out of box" classroom strategy or even something that is required like teachers getting their required professional development hours, the initial answer is always no. This is the most frustrating thing I have ever experienced in a professional work environment. Everything is always "policy and procedure" this or "district policy" that. Most days I'm optimistic but sometimes I get really down. I want to help the kids and give them new and real world experiences, of course while covering all the standards. Case in point, some of our CTAE students attended a district-wide health and wellness symposium at Atlanta Metropolitan State College this past Wednesday. The field trip had to be rescheduled because it was originally scheduled to take place during our 2nd Snowpocalypse. Our CTAE department notified us (after the district notified them) that we did not have to resubmit the field trip paperwork, we only needed to have the students and parents complete a new permission slip. My administration did not allow this. I wasn't made aware that I had to resubmit all the field trip paperwork until the Monday before the trip. On this past Monday I had to drive to 3 separate locations and retrieve signatures because interoffice mail would not have gotten the paperwork to the necessary offices before the field trip. It was storming rain and very chilly on Monday. I really wanted my students to attend the symposium so I did what was required from my administration to make that happen. I feel resubmitting the paperwork was very unnecessary, especially since the district did not require it. Why must potential road blocks be placed in front of us, while attempting to help the students?