Yes @orangefish, S19’s schedule is posted. He got all the classes he requested (AP Physics 1, AP Psych, Honors Precalc, English 11 HN, US VA History Honors, Advanced Orch., and STEM Engineering). We received an email from the school yesterday letting us know that the school has unexpectedly had an extra 100+ kids register in the last week, so they are going to be adding sections and re-doing some schedules, so we shouldn’t consider today’s schedule to be “final.”
He got the AP Psych teacher who piles on the busywork and isn’t happy that every single one of his friends who is taking AP Physics is in a different class. (Although apparently he already sent a “carefully worded” email to his GC to request a change).
We don’t have S’s schedule yet. We know that he has AP Gov because they have homework over the summer but have no idea about the rest of his classes. He has a slot for one more elective but doesn’t know what they gave him yet or what teachers he has for anything. I don’t think he will find out until the first day of school.
I wonder why some of your kids don’t know their classes until school starts. Our school confirms the kids’ classes back in April. If there’s a conflict with two classes, they let us know and we can usually work it out. I’ve never heard of anyone not getting a core class…sometimes an elective isn’t offered for a particular semester so those can get messed up. If that happens, though, they give you a list of options and you can pick something else.
S19 had a problem because his advanced painting class and his portfolio class were only offered for the second semester so he had no art class to take first semester. The GC and his art teacher cooked up a plan for him. They put him in a studio art class first semester but on his transcript it’s called “Advanced Painting Honors”. LOL. He’s in the studio art class but doing his own thing at his own table. It’s his own little advanced painting honors class! I had NO idea they would do this but, when I complained that it wasn’t his fault that they didn’t have an honors painting class offered first semester, they figured it out. I was so surprised. They told him not to tell any of his classmates about this exception.
@4MyKidz@OrangeFish Thanks for commiserating! Want a good laugh? I just realized that the Oct 7th SAT (which S19 wanted to do as well as the Aug 26th one since he spent so much time studying over the summer) is the Saturday before the big xc conference meet. :))
If I don’t laugh I might cry…or at least I might find myself shouting down a coach in the near future. Seriously, though, if he’s running well and they give me the business about holding him out of the conference meet, I’m going to the principal. One missed Saturday of training means nothing when it comes to his training and they just pull the kids from these meets as a form of punishment.
Some of the xc runners drove down to southern Illinois to see the eclipse in totality yesterday. They are afraid to see the coaches today because missing practice for the only total eclipse in their lifetime isn’t an excused absence. [-X
@homerdog Our school asks for alternate classes to deal with scheduling conflicts, but the actual master schedule isn’t made public until right before school starts.
S19 is awake and not happy about his schedule - not a single good friend in any class besides orchestra. He and his GF are taking the exact same 7 classes and have ONE class together. GF got the “good” AP Psych teacher (the one who teaches instead of assigning endless worksheets). So he had already asked if he could switch his Physics class to a different period and his GC’s response email to him was just three last names (???)
Son’s mood for final days of summer = sullen. This has happened every year with both kids. Since I have kids who don’t particularly like school, it really means a lot to them to at least suffer through it with familiar faces in their classrooms.
@eh1234 I think transition from summer to school is always hard. S19 and D21 sulked around here for the two days before school started. S19 didn’t sleep well either. I think he was just imagining how different his days were about to become. Summer had only two daily obligations - xc practice from 7-9 and an hour of SAT practice per day. When school starts, it’s seven hours of class, three hour xc practice, and four/five hours of homework. Being sullen makes sense to me. ugh.
Maybe the last names the GC sent your son were the names of the other Physics teachers and he’s asking him to choose?
S19 does have some friends in most classes but D21 has none. I mean none. Not even kids she recognizes. She’s making the best of it and trying to meet new friends. Somehow, I think that’s easier to do as a freshman than as a junior.
I hear you about status=sullen @eh1234 – D19 is looking forward to Theatre class and her AP arts class, but that’s it. She is already stressing over how her days are going to be – @homerdog, you described it perfectly.
D19’s ACT date is September 9. I do so hope it is one and done, but I of course am not saying anything. She needs a little victory at the start of junior year.
S19 also has 3 teachers who are new to the school and apparently the worst physics teacher and the bad engineering teacher (he wanted the lady with all the tattoos, lol). All of his friends have the same teacher for pre-calc that they had for Algebra 2 (for my quiet kid, having the same teacher two years in a row would be a big plus when it comes to getting a recommendation). He also has 7 female teachers and likes to have a mix of men and women. He is looking forward to Orchestra and that’s about it.
Hoping for ACT and SAT victories for all of the '19 kids. Mine will need a miracle!
We got schedules here today too. D19’s one hiccup is that her section of band conflicted with Latin 3. Apparently she worked it out with the band teacher to take a different section of band but still play with her correct level for concerts. She’s happy with it so I’m fine. She off at band camp with next to no cell coverage/internet so I haven’t heard yet if she has friends in her classes. Mostly she’s happy that she got the last minute change from AP Comp Sci. to AP Econ. So she has Calc BC, AP Chem, AP Econ, Honors US history, Honors English, Latin 3, and Band.
She gets back from Band camp on thursday. Friday braces come off a couple hours before she marches in the first football game. Monday school starts.
@homerdog that is terrible behavior by the coach. Where we live they take sports pretty seriously and don’t encourage travel and vacations while in season. But they don’t punish the kids when they take a morning from training off to take the SAT/ACT. The coaches understand the kids need to do it, and I’ve never seen a kid reprimanded for it. If the kids miss practice to a vacation day then they usually miss playing in the next game as a consequence.
DS19 started back today. He was eager and excited to get his Jr year started. Looking forward to his ECs. This year his HS is issuing chromebooks to every student which is supposed to be increasing individualized learning . Dropped DS16 back at school over the weekend. DS19 spent quite a bit of time discussing options at the school for his interests with DS16’s Honors advisor. He definitely put the program on his list. His SAT prep class begins Sun. It runs for 6 weeks . He’s also organizing his Eagle Scout project. This year will go by so quick.
D19 leaves today on a 10-day sea kayaking trip—her school has two-week minicourses to start the school year, and she’s getting an unnecessary phys ed credit, but should end up with good stories, so that’s good. (It’s also the same day D17 flies off to college orientation, though, and it’s all being a bit much for D25).
Her schedule once minicourses are over still hasn’t been posted, though (class requests go in back in May, and minicourses are confirmed then, but it’s a small zone-exemption school and there’s always a bit of staff turnover, making it pretty much impossible to complete assigning classes until the start of school), and she’s rather nervous about what’s going to happen with her English class [alert! humblebrag ahead]—she’s been a year ahead in lit and writing classes since middle school, and she’s simultaneously worried she will/worried she won’t get placed in the senior-year dual-enrollment composition class.
@homerdog That si crazy about the CC coach! D19 doesn’t play any sports, but I am afraid we are abut to have a similar problem with D21. She plays soccer and is hoping to try out for the team at school - just the Freshman or JV team. She also loves theater and signed up for the musical theater class as her elective. The teacher just told them to be prepared to be after school every day from November-March! Not sure how that is going to work, there is a soccer meeting next week so she will ask the coach. She doesn’t want me asking the drama teacher yet because she doesn’t want her to be annoyed with her when school just started.
@dfbdfb That si so cool that your school has mini courses! I loved my mini course/orientation trip that I did before college. I am still best friends with one of the people I met on the trip.
@eh1234 Sorry about your S’s schedule. I hate when the kids have no friends in their classes. I always hope they at least have a good friend in math so they can get homework help!
So it looks like D is not taking the SAT the weekend. We were supposed to prep all summer but she pretty much did nothing. We took another practice test yesterday (just the math half) and she has really bad scores. I’m not surprised since she didn’t practice at all except going over her wrong answers from her last test with her tutor. I think she went on Khan one time - she is not very self motivated lately. I just went on the school website and they announced they are having a prep course run by a local company from Sept. 7 - Oct. 5. Two times a week after school plus three practice tests (we will miss one.) She is not happy about it but I signed her up with a friend and then she can try the Oct. 7th SAT date.
@momtogkc Yep. I think high school is when our well-rounded kids turn into specialists if they have not done so earlier. First, S19 had to give up band because it requires marching band and that couldn’t work with soccer (S19 used to play soccer and did so freshman year). So, his saxophone days were over. He did Model UN for the three summers of middle school, but that didn’t work in high school with soccer/club soccer and continues not to work with XC. He’s held on to art since his art teacher outside of school has known him since he was eight and makes all kinds of accommodations for him to just come to her studio when he can.
I do not understand all of these kids on CC who do sports, three clubs, volunteer, work a job and have leadership positions in all of those things. All I can guess is that each of those things within their school is less competitive than the situation our kids are faced with. Maybe that’s not true but it makes me feel better to believe it! I just keep telling myself that kids from our high school go to plenty of good colleges and they all play by the same rules as our two kids.
@homerdog oh that’s horrible! I am so mad on your behalf. Our school enforces the state min required number of practices before the first meet but there is more flexibility after that, at least in my experience with track, XC, soccer, swim and tennis
I don’t know the exact rules but I do know our kids have missed (rarely) and not been penalized if it was a reasonable reason.
@eandsmom the coach never responded to my two emails asking about repercussions for taking the SAT on the Saturday before a meet. We had a parent meeting tonight and another father asked about the kids taking the SAT (my hero!) and the head coach wafffled a bit and said they have rules posted on the website…and then the assistant coach perked up and said the SAT will be an exception to the rule and it’s ok for the kids to miss practice. And they can run in that week’s meet. Not sure what kind of conversation those two coaches had with each other after that meeting but at least we were told that the boys can run!
Quick poll- do you all stay up until the kids have finished their homework? Our kids are both good about focusing and getting right to work but sometimes they are still up later than I would like to be. Tonight, with xc practice and then the team parent meeting, S19 didn’t start homework until 7:45. It’s 11:00 and I want to go to bed but I feel bad leaving him up by himself. (My husband feel asleep an hour ago. Lol.) I’m hoping he’s done soon so I can hit the hay!
I do not stay up. Kids have occasional (3 or 4 times a school year?) very late night homework sessions, and we’re trying to reduce the number of those. (With ADHD, very late night homework usually results in diminishing returns.)
