<p>I cannot believe how much happier D1 is, post-AP. A great weight has been lifted! Now come the fun projects in her academic classes, but our district’s school year has been cut by a week, so one week less of fun. She’s also talking about next year’s schedule. For electives, she’s now thinking a Film class (watching, not making) and AP Psych. </p>
<p>She went in for a physical today. This may be the last one where a parent gets called in by the doctor for a doctor-child-parent discussion, because next time she’ll be a legal adult. :eek:</p>
<p>Crewguy: Have you looked at either Whitman in Walla Walla, WA or Lewis and Clark in Portland. Both have excellent international studies departments. And Whitman has a theme house for students interested in Asian Studies and one for Students interested in Japanese studies.</p>
<p>D is also a very happy camper post AP. She told me yesterday that her AP Psych teacher asked her if she wanted to do an “Independent Study” class with her next year. Apparently teacher is working on a grant and needs someone to do the research, write the proposal etc. D is very excited. Got the paperwork from counselor (all before she even talked to me!) - apparently GC asked her why she would do an Independent study. I think the implication was that this could be considered as a “fluff” class. What do others think?</p>
<p>Her schedule for next year currently includes 5 APs, 1 Honors class and Orchestra. If she were to do the Independent Study, she would drop one of the APs.</p>
<p>Our student’s last AP for the year is right now—tick tock–Latin Vergil (or is it Virgil…?)
anyway
know we will have a happier teen in a few hours…
then a week until exams
then a week and the SAT…</p>
<p>(next yr 6 APs are on the Senior year schedule)</p>
<p>sooo for our teen
this weekend is about sleep, eating,
and I think I will ask for a little help cleaning the pool,
So maybe I’ll take our student out for dinner/movie etc? (My hubby is going to be on a hike with our younger student)
…I know our student wants new sunglasses and wants to go to Old Navy…</p>
<p>arisamp- are you kidding me? I think her GC is crazy, this is a great opportunity. Even if it turns out to be fluff, I am sure your D can word it in such a way to make it look more impressive.</p>
<p>arisamp, I’m guessing that this teacher will be writing one of your D’s recs. Unless this teacher is totally clueless in writing, and would say that your D did some clerical work for her, the full meaning of “Independent study” will be explained.</p>
<p>5 and 6 AP’s. Wow! That’s as much as my son will have when he graduates. Actually, I don’t think that’s even possible at our school - not that I mind. That is ALOT of work!</p>
<p>D is signed up for 3 APs next year. Her friends are trying to talk her into two more. I think 5 would be too many for her, mostly because English next year is Literature and she’s not a fast reader.</p>
<p>My son will be taking two or three AP’s next year, depending on how well he does in a class this year. He’s taking two now and took one last year. Any more and I don’t think he would be able to stay afloat. I can’t imagine the reading involved in 5 or 6 AP classes, let alone the workload.</p>
<p>kathiep - I am trying to talk her down on the number of APs next year. One reason why she thought I would be thrilled with the Independent Study idea!! I am actually kind of happy - after seeing the stress this year with 3 APs, I don’t want her taking 5 next year. But she insists that none of the other classes are interesting or challenging enough.</p>
<p>English and Physics are two that I thought she could “downgrade” to Honors and be ok, but she doesn’t want to do it. Part of her reasoning is that some of the other kids in the Honors classes are not serious enough and the class feels like a waste of time. She’s taking Sociology this year and claims it is the easiest course of all so far. In some ways, I think this kid does her best when she’s got a lot of work to handle and in a short time - she seems to work better that way!</p>
<p>LuckyBoy and Austrian Exchange Friend are off to the girls’ school prom S is going with the GF and AEF is going with an Austrian girl. I spent the day being Handy Mom: hemmed the tux pants, pressed the tux and shirt, and created 2 quite lovely white rose wrist corsages :)</p>
<p>S forgot to order corsages… :eek: With the help of youtube videos, floral tape and wire, and Costco flowers I saved us a bunch o’ money I’ll have to find out what colors the girls are wearing next Friday (boys’ school prom)! GF is wearing green and black and AEGirl is wearing black, so that’s why I picked white. </p>
<p>We realized two nights ago that S couldn’t drive tonight! His bday is in two weeks, the date when he can legally drive more than one unrelated person. So H is driving tonight and I may do next week. H is armed with the camera for pre-prom pictures at GF’s house. I hope there is no proma with GF’s mother tonight…it’s been a long week…</p>
<p>Speaking of APs: S will be taking 6 next year—the other half of Physics C (same teacher, same textbook), Stats, Psych, Enviro Sci, English Lit (taken at the girls’ school), and US Govt. His GC says that will actually be an easier load compared to this year’s 4 (C Mech, Calc AB, Engl Lang, USH). We’ll see. </p>
<p>I hope he signed up on Naviance to meet the State Flagship rep at school on Tuesday. Deadline is tonight. I think I’ll check later ;)</p>
<p>Thanks Kumitedad. We have Whitman on the radar. A litlle concerned that it is isolated. Our family is so gald this week is over. Not only were there AP tests but because S school considers two of his classes “senior” classes he had finals in those classes this week as well. Seniors at his school take finals the week befor everyone else. Ughhh… It makes me slightly concerned for next year with 3 APs. KLucky - how was AP Calculus AB? That is one S is taking next year.</p>
<p>A few weeks ago, for debate (LD!), I got first at districts, first at Regionals and 5th at states. Is a 5th place finish in a state competition with including on the application or do colleges only care about winner/runner-up?</p>
<p>CIA, Put everything in that will fit in the space. You may find that there is too little room for everything.</p>
<p>KLucky, Good job on getting the kids out of the door for the prom!</p>
<p>We’re now having some “prama” here. Our prom is set for next Saturday at a ski resort that is just over 30 minutes from the closest border of our school district. Prom is set to end at 10:30. In Pennsylvania, all drivers must be off the road by 11 pm if they are under 18. Exceptions can be made, but I don’t think prom is one of them. There is no highway near this place, it’s all back roads that are winding and through hills. Many of us parents are going to be driving (which seems strange) because a limo is apparently not done in our kids groups. Also, before and after prom doings are not yet set. My son and his GF have different sets of friends… ugh! What we do have are clothes and flowers so I guess that’s something!</p>
<p>crewguy1, S said that Calc AB was hard but not terrible. Their teacher is TOUGH, really tough, and had them working on “AP problems of the week” since the first week of school. She’d give them problems from old AP exams relating to what they were studying at that point. The guys were VERY used to the format by the real exam time.</p>
<p>H said there were 18 couples at the pre-prom tonight :eek: I asked LuckyBoy earlier how many to expect next Friday when we host pre-prom for his prom----he said somewhere between 10 and 25. Couples. :eek: :eek: :eek: I need a final count by Tuesday for planning purposes! (And I want to let all the parents know they are welcome to come, too.)</p>
<p>crewguy–
Whitman is isolated, but what a terrific college it is! We visited last month and I was so impressed. I got the distinct impression that the students there are extremely happy. Walla Walla is a cute town, but there’s not a lot there for students to do. One student I talked to said he stays on campus most of the time and there’s always something fun going on. Plenty of students take trips to Seattle, Tri-Cities or Portland if your son wants to get away. And there are always groups going on outdoor activity outings. </p>
<p>If I could go back in time and go to college again as a freshman, I’d love to go there!</p>
This could have been written by me about my S. We wrote the AP Chem teacher earlier this year to inquire about grades and she wrote back that he doesn’t finish homework and he’s never stressed about anything. She wished he could get just stressed enough to do more on his homework, but not overstressed. Then she assured us that he is a pleasure to have in class, always polite and always respectful and helpful That’s him. He takes the classes that the “smart” kids take but he isn’t as concerned with how he does as the typical student taking those courses. He mostly learns the material, but won’t do anything extra to do better to save his life…</p>
<p>Kajon posted:
My son has been involved in MUN (best we could do for debate) for his entire high school life - I wish it would have given him a drive to do better. He’s organized when he wants to be, but not otherwise.</p>
<p>And my S will have an odd pairing for APs next year too - Music Theory in the morning and Physics all afternoon.</p>
<p>oregonianmom: My S visited there when we were researching colleges, and the remoteness was a turn off for him. I wish he could have seen past that, but he is happy with his final choice so who am I to say</p>
<p>My son is worried that he won’t have enough AP’s to be competitive… He had four fully weighted blocks this year (out of seven) English Language, Chem Lecture, Chem Lab, however his math (functions/analytic/geo) is not AP. So he’s not sure if it will count as 2 or 3. Chem was two classes and two exams so I think it will count as two, making it three for the year.
Next year he will only have three, English Literature, Calc AB, and Physics C. So he’ll end up with 6 AP total, but 7.5 weighted classes. Who knows? He is frustrated because he knows that he will be judged against students who have taken far more than that. He feels he’s made mature decisions… where’s the points for that? he asks. I don’t know. Every class he’s taken (beyond the required two years of PE) has been academic. No basket weaving to lighten the load.
When he has a demanding EC that keeps him at school from 2pm-10pm three nights a week, and Saturday & Sunday, it would be hard to find time to do homework for another AP class. As it is, I find him asleep with his head on his keyboard at 2am. Unfortunately there is no spot on a college application for that.
As we started to visit schools we quickly realized that the ‘well rounded’ student they were looking for meant ‘superb’ in every possible way.</p>
S is going with the GF and AEF is going with an Austrian girl. I spent the day being Handy Mom: hemmed the tux pants, pressed the tux and shirt, and created 2 quite lovely white rose wrist corsages :)</p>
I’ll have to find out what colors the girls are wearing next Friday (boys’ school prom)! GF is wearing green and black and AEGirl is wearing black, so that’s why I picked white. </p>