THE secondary school students were excited about their trip to Universal Studios Singapore (USS).
The free trip was the Singapore Youth Olympic Games Organising Committee's (SYOGOC) way of thanking the students for helping out as volunteers in the games.
But their excitement soon turned to disappointment when they were turned away at the theme park at Resorts World Sentosa on Tuesday morning.
The group of 150 secondary school students from Queenstown Secondary School were told to return again that evening instead.
According to the students, their teacher had received an e-mail from the SYOGOC saying that they could visit the theme park from "0630 to 2300" on Tuesday.
So the group turned up at 11.30am.
As it turned out, they could be at the park only from 6.30pm onwards. Not 6.30am.
The-mail sender meant "1830" instead of "0630".
A spokesman for the SYOGOC confirmed that there was a "mistake in the invitation (to the school) on the timing of the visit".
The committee has apologised to the school for the mistake and the inconvenience caused.
The spokesman added that they will be reimbursing the school for transport costs incurred.
Secondary 2 student Banff Tan, 14, told The New Paper: "I was so disappointed. It was my first time there. I was looking forward to taking the rides."
The students were told about the trip last week, which was supposed to be from 11am to 5.30pm.
They were told by their teachers to assemble in school at 10.30am, where chartered buses then took them to the park.
The New Paper understands that more than one teacher was present.
"Everyone was in high spirits on the way there. But things changed when we reached the entry gate of Universal Studios," said Sec 2 student Kelvin Wong, 15.
They were told by staff that they could enter the park only from 6.30pm.
They could then remain there until 11pm.
But the teachers decided to take the students back to school at 2.45pm.
"We had an oral examination the next day so we needed to go back and practise," said Sec 2 student Zwe Wint Naing, 15.
Before they left, the students explored the shopping areas outside USS.
They were told that if they wanted to go back to the park later in the day, they could do so on their own.
But some like Banff and Wint decided not to. "My oral is quite bad so I thought I should practise more for it," Banff said.
Banff said that about 40 students, including Kelvin and two other schoolmates, went back to USS in the evening.
All the students who qualified for the free trip had earlier each been given a $10 food voucher that was valid only inside the park.
So Kelvin and his friends each collected a few vouchers from their schoolmates to use for their dinner there.
The students said they were told during morning assembly yesterday to "forgive the YOG people since they said they were sorry".
When contacted, the SYOGOC spokesman explained they had planned for various schools and organisations to visit USS to "thank the volunteers of the Singapore 2010 Youth Olympic Games".
Specially arranged visits The visits were specially arranged in the evenings to minimise disruptions to volunteers' daily routine.
Queenstown Secondary School was among those invited.
On Sept 13, the SYOGOC discovered there was a mistake in the invitation on the timing of the visit.
It is not known when the invites were sent out.
So they sent a second e-mail to inform the volunteers of the correct timing.
But Queenstown Secondary School was left out of this e-mail list.
When the SYOGOC found out that the students were at the theme park at the wrong time, they asked the theme park's management to make an exception for the students to enter the park.
"However, as thetheme park had reached full capacity, (the management) was unable to accede to the request," said the spokesman.
This article was first published in The New Paper.
