Going to college without a high school education.

Hey everyone; I do hope I’m posting this in the right place. I apologize if it isn’t.

I’ve got a very bizarre situation on my hands that I’ve had trouble figuring out due to less than helpful academic advisors- I’m attempting to get into college despite having no education since the fourth grade. A little (or long) explanation might help here.

In the fourth grade I began showing signs of being a gifted student, things like picking up chess in less than a day, teaching myself the piano by sound, and I was even reading at a high school freshman level. My parents were extremely unhappy with this, as they were part of a near-cult sect of Christianity that focused heavily on anti-intellectualism. They decided to pull me out of school before the fifth grade and “homeschool” me, despite neither parent being a high school graduate. What followed was eight years of my mother lying to the orchestrator of said school, by way of making me copy answers out of her teacher’s book. Needless to say, I learned nothing. In my freshman year of high school, she tried to send me back into the public system because she was tired of my teenage antics; I failed miserably due to not having necessary prior knowledge and I managed to get the first F- in the history of the school. She pulled me back out and punished me, of course.

At 17, home life was horrifying. My brother was near psychotic- it wasn’t irregular to find a SWAT team organized outside of our trailer park home and I was hardly allowed to leave the house. I began hiding philosophy and art books under my bed to feed my budding interest in the world, but my mother found them and decided to pour spaghetti sauce into all the pages. Weird, I know. I was decent with drawing and applied to the Academy of Art in San Francisco because it didn’t require a GPA or a portfolio. My mother bribed the head of the homeschool agency for a diploma, as both parents were of the opinion that children shouldn’t live with their parents after 18. I left for college and had my first taste of the real world.

My grades were awful as I was unable to even figure out how to learn, how to study. The idea of a deadline was beyond my understanding and so my teachers all failed me. On top of this, I was struggling with psychosis and depression, still unaware that I had Bipolar 1 disorder because my past episodes had been explained to me by my parents as “demonic powers”. Yeah, it was that bad. I lost my apartment, and my will to live, but was saved by the fact that I’m a fairly logical, unfeeling person and it just made more sense to take my medication than jump out a window. I haven’t had an episode since.

For two years after school, I tried to feed my interests but I was losing steam. The two things that stuck with me were an interest in physics (that generally went un-studied as I had NO math knowledge and just figured I was awful at it) and a larger interest in photography. After cutting all ties with my family and moving to Pittsburgh, I logged 360 hours on my 3DS in two months and realized that I needed to do something with my life.

My interest in the photographer Man Ray actually led me to his assistant, Berenice Abbott. Her scientific photography struck a chord with me and I became obsessed with the idea of shooting physics (so rarely done, being so difficult) in both abstract and documentary form. This also led me to find out that even telescopes and microscopes were too limited in this field- newer ideas such as the quantum camera were emerging but my choices were still too few. My ideas had expanded to not just photography, but engineering optics to my personal needs. The difficulty in getting to this point would be huge but I was resolute in my ideas.

This brings us to now. Over the next year, I plan to make up all of the schooling I’ve missed. To start things off, I took a practice SAT to see where I stood; Absolutely nothing on the test made sense to me. The terminology, the equations, and the grammar was so far beyond me. So I made up my own ways to solve the questions as I went along. I worked out everything according to logic and how I thought numbers and words might work. It was after a long day at work, I hadn’t been in school for fourteen years; I was sure I had failed miserably when my timer went off, but lo and behold- I scored 650 in in critical reading, 680 in math, and 600 in writing. I cried for the rest of the night. My goal is to get a 2200 when I take the official test. For now I’ve been studying five hours a day and plan to do so for the next year until I can enter a Community College, where I plan to take computer sciences and learn CAD programs, as well as get Calc 1,2,3 and differential equations out of the way. It’ll take three years, but I’d like to have that knowledge before going to get a BS in physics.

SO TL;DR:

My parents were @$%&heads and now I’m trying to reteach myself high school. I scored a 1930 on my practice SAT with no studying. I want to go to community college for 2 years before applying to Universities. Here are my questions!

Would taking honors count just the same in community college as it would in high school? Are honors courses weighted or does it depend on the school?

My community college offers very few clubs and extracurriculars; do outside organizations count on a college application?

Would it hurt my chances if I take mostly online courses in community college? I have to work full time while studying, so on-campus learning might be hard… but I have no doubts that I can pull a 4.0.

Do universities care about your age? I’ll be 25 after finishing community college.

For physics majors or better yet, those who have graduated from a physics program; do you think it’s important that I learn a few languages and CAD programs before school? It seems like the universities don’t teach you that sort of thing unless you’re in an engineering program. I’m thinking I’d like to learn C++, Fortran, Python, Ruby, Matlab and then Autodesk and maybe OSLO or Zemax eventually.

Will universities have a problem with my high school background or would they go purely off of what I accomplished after?

That said, these are my schools of choice. Maybe slightly unrealistic, but if I don’t try, I won’t know.

Reach:
Columbia University
Caltech
University of Chicago

Possible:
Carnegie Mellon
UCLA

Safety:
University of Pittsburgh
Virginia Tech

Any help is extremely appreciated. I apologize for the epic of my life written here, but it’s so hard to explain what I need without it and my advisors at CCAC have gotten upset at me for the confusion caused by all this. Thanks!

One more question; does my SAT score even count if I’ve never taken it before but I’m 22?

After taking courses at a community college, you will have to apply as a transfer. If you will be ready to transfer as a junior in your major, then some colleges do not need high school stuff at all, while others give it little importance. You may have to get a GED for some.

Being 25, you should not need parent financial information for financial aid. Check net price calculators.

I technically have a diploma, though. And what if I don’t want to do it as a transfer? What I would like to do is take the three years for… let’s call it personal betterment. Most physics programs seem to forego the whole gen-ed part of schooling, and instead you spend a full four years learning physics. I want those four years, but I also want to take computer sciences before that. The only credits I wouldn’t mind transferring would be for mathematics.

First off, I’m sorry about your situation. “Home schoolers” like that are detestable; they give all home schooling a bad name, which isn’t fair to legitimate home educators. Your parents’ interpretation of the Christian religion to thwart your education is also disgusting. Heck, even if they’d forced you to read the Bible every day you’d have picked up a lot of reading comprehension, but I’m guessing that your parents didn’t actually read or understand much of it. You are clearly quite bright. You might want to try getting your GED just to make it easier if anyone asks. Definitely get on your feet with community college then you can probably transfer someplace good if your GPA is good and you have some good activities. Try for the reaches, who knows.

Universities accept people of all ages, as does the workforce.

Okay, so I can take a take a GED test despite technically having a diploma? That would actually make things much easier in setting a sort of timeline to give to universities. And as you said, it’s just easier to explain. Thank you!

And I do agree with you; I resent them for making legitimate homeschooling/Christianity look bad. Though I’m not religious myself, I definitely take into account that they were certifiably crazy and I still maintain my respect for both religion and schooling choices in the right circumstances. They were one psych evaluation away from being Westboro Baptists, ha.

Oh, you have a point there about already having one, idk. Is it from accredited home school entity? I’ve never heard of a home school “diploma” that holds any legal weight, but that just might be my experience. I’m home schooled, and both my sisters just took the GED to show they graduated high school. But it may be different depending what state you’re in.

Pay a visit to the admissions office at the community college, and find out if your “diploma” is considered to be a legitimate one. If it isn’t, enroll in a GED prep course, and work your way through the exam series. If it is considered legitmate, take the screening and placement exams that the community college requires, and find out what remedial coursework you need. In addition to remedial math and English classes, it is likely that some kind of study skills courses will also be available to you.

You need have to have a recognized high school diploma, or a GED in order to be eligible to receive any federal financial aid. So get that sorted out first.

If you take credit-bearing classes at the community college, it is almost certain that you will be required to apply as a transfer student when you are ready to move on to a 4-year college or university. But just because you apply as a transfer, it doesn’t automatically mean that any of your credits will count toward your new degree plan. You might find that you have to spend a full four years at the new place anyway. For specific advice about the best way to approach things, meet with the Transfer Advisor at the community college. That person’s whole job is to help students transfer successfully to places that serve their academic and professional goals.

I just called the supposed homeschool program that my mother enrolled me in to see if I can get my diploma mailed. Turns out it’s just a bookstore that sells ‘homeschool diplomas’ and they customize it with your parent’s name under the teacher section. My guess is that this isn’t legitimate. GED it is.

%$^#.

Yeah, that’s what I figured. Go for the GED, since it’s not like you can prove you went though a regular home school curriculum.

I don’t think they care about your age. Lots of people go back o school after working. Just do you best to get in cc and then get a 4.0 or as well as you can. If you do achieve a 4.0, you can go to a fairly prestigious school. Even if not, you could probably get in a good school (don’t get below 3.0. Its ok to take few classes)

One thing to note: You will need proof of high school completion or equivalency to qualify for federal financial aid. Some school districts will provide a verification that the homeschooled student completed an appropriate curriculum, but that doesn’t appear to be the case in your situation.

So far it seems like the best course of action would be to get my GED right away. Is it any harder than the SAT? Does a high score count for anything?

I am so sorry for what your parents did to you. :s

It’s actually a godsend that your HS diploma is a fake one.
It means you can have free classes for your GED and a legitimate timeline for colleges.
The GED is MUCH easier than the SAT. If you take the SAT and get a high score,it’ll be a plus for you, but since you’ll attend community college, it won’t matter much, as your performance in your CC classes will matter most. Be careful in choosing the course provider, and prefer a “brick and mortar” college to a purely virtual “forprofit” school (which is very similar to that place where your mother got your diploma).

Are you a woman? Because “elite” women’s colleges have special programs to help “mature” students who had bad luck but are smart. Look into this program, in particular, since Smith has both Art/photography and engineering, and the Ada Comstock program is a leader in its area.
http://www.smith.edu/admission/ada.php

Cal tech with an SAT math score below 700 is not happening. Sorry. It’s a long shot for anyone with a score under 750. 75% of students have above a 770.

I know someone in a very similar situation who is currently working through community college. Whatever you do, don’t give up! You’re on the right track. Focus on getting your GED and in the process getting your background knowledge up to an early college level. Then make sure you understand the transfer requirements at the universities that interest you and take the classes at community college to fulfill those requirements. You may want to speak to admissions departments directly and definitely speak to an advisor at your community college–you need an advocate and good advice!. Your situation is unusual. It may be difficult to explain but you are likely to get better advice and find some help along the way if you are persistent in finding people who are interested in your situation and have the specific knowledge to help you reach your goals.
Your age is not a concern at all. People of all ages take classes at college or pursue degrees. My grandma became a nurse in her 50s.

To CaliCash- You know, you’re the second person who has told me not to try for CalTech. What you don’t seem to understand is that the score I listed for my practice SAT was 1930 with my own completely made-up equations. I have never learned these things before, and so I had to figure out with no prior knowledge how to solve these problems. I went back through my scratch paper and reread over every answer I got versus the answers on the score sheet. My equations were nowhere near the same. But I was able to work them out via logic. I recognize what CalTech is and if after I complete three years of advanced math and computer sciences, I feel I’m still not ready…I will still apply. The disappointment is not in being rejected, it’s in not trying. In my opinion, a school like CalTech (especially in Physics) will not be looking for somebody with only great stats. They will want somebody who can think in an abstract and unorthodox way; that is part of what physics is all about, part of why it clicks with me. If we didn’t take a leap of faith into trying to explain quantum mechanics, despite it being absolutely ridiculous when compared to Einstein’s proven theories- we’d be pretty far behind technologically speaking. But Bohr took the chance on creating his own equations, as unreal as they felt and they were proven right. THAT is the type of person that I think CalTech is looking for.

In terms of my SAT, when I take the official test, I have no doubts that I could get above a 2200.

On a related note, a man approached me the other day while at the library. I had just finished reading “The Large Scale Structure of Space-Time” and had picked up Foucault and started reading- He walks up and says “Wow darling, those are some pretty hard books you’ve got there! Somebody forcing you to read them?”

To which I replied “No, but I just finished “Quantum Physics for Poets” last week and wanted to continue with the theme.”

He walked away real fast.

These are the things that inspire me to do above and beyond the low expectations people have of me.

And to Parentof2014Grad- Thank you. I really appreciate the support.

First of all I’m so sorry that all that happened to you. The type of education that your parents made you go through (or lack of education really) is what gives legitimate homeschoolers a bad name. Usually I don’t take this type of stance BUT it would be better for you to get your GED and go to community college. After working hard on that and showing that you can handle college level education, you can apply to transfer to other schools.

The other alternative is getting the GED, taking the SAT, and applying to normal colleges like CalTech etc. given that you get over a 2200 on the actual SAT. I definitely am not telling you to give up or compromise your goals and desires in ANY way. You can accomplish anything if you put your mind to it, but I do hope you can at least consider community college.

Good luck with everything!