my kid took AP chem through Northwestern online and it was pretty good. They got a 4 on the exam I think they offer a bunch of online courses. Gfg I am sorry you have to go through this. It sounds awful!!!
I was just thinking that it doesn’t show kindness/responsibility by that teacher who recommended your D for another AP the following year after the she struggled so much. S/he could really be asked for help to follow through. When I recommend a student for an advanced course, I make it known that the student can come back and ask for help on questions if they struggle.
Different D. The one who was failing AP Chem was D1, the D that graduated from Stanford. This is D2, a junior, and it is her first science AP. She took advanced physics I, honors bio I and honors chem. I before this class. D2’s honors chem teachers recommended her for AP Chem, but I knew that would be a bad idea after seeing how D1 struggled. S managed AP Bio OK, so we opted for that instead. Little did I know how much the curriculum had changed in ten years.
When someone posts, “The AP classes in our school system are so demanding that a substantial percentage of students are getting outside tutoring in all subjects, they assign too much work so students don’t have time for a life, they require prerequisite knowledge that they don’t teach, and the teachers are shaming students,” the right response is not “Your daughter is too stupid for an AP class.”
If TheGFG removed her daughter from this class, that would not solve the problem. The problem is a systemic one which cannot be solved by one parent removing her child from a class.
Right, and my kids aside (whom I am presenting as mere examples that you seem eager to dismiss, so feel free to do that), this is what is happening in places like WWP and other affluent districts in NJ, CA and other states. Even if my kids are too dumb for AP’s, you have plenty of parents complaining now. Also, it not just Caucasian parents sounding the alarm, it is well-educated Asian parents to whom people seem to attribute greater credibility, After all, the popular conception these days is that white kids are just too lazy and entitled compared to Asian kids.
I didn’t say anyone was “stupid” - I said that the recommending teacher bore some responsibility for the placement, actually. And I think that if a given child in a given district in a given year, finds that there is a bad situation, that child and family can do some things (e.g. change course, though I understand that ship has sailed this year) to mitigate the situation. We may not agree @“Cardinal Fang” @TheGFG on everything, but I really don’t think either of those two statements were particularly controversial.
I agree it’s a systemic problem, but in the meanwhile, TheGFG’s daughter suffers needlessly.
Second semester will start soon - TheGFG can march into the GC’s office, explain that due to the NEW (not announced till after registration) lab policy, her daughter must drop AP Bio and will be taking it online. Change of courses at the semester should be allowed. If not, talk with a lawyer: with two labs to complete in addition to everything else and two labs missed (hence, not learned, hence, making her behind), it’s unlikely TheGFG’s daughter CAN stay in the class and she’s unlikely to be the only one, so if no provision has been made for kids who need to drop the class, there’s a lawsuit waiting to happen. Keep in mind that, as far as colleges are concerned, there’s no difference between a Virtual School’s AP and PWW AP. Frankly, at this point, I’d really advise homeschooling - TheGFG’s daughter sounds disciplined enough and even taking 7 or 8 online classes wouldn’t produce that much headache. AND FOR COLLEGES IT WOULD NOT MATTER. In fact, by freeing time up to personal reading (read 5 nonfiction books that deal with the civil war and compare their perspectives… read scientific nonfiction and elect favorites…) you’d have a student who’d fare better in college admissions, who’d have a healthier lifestyle and fewer physical/emotional problems, and would learn more/more efficiently. Use your browser, it’s perfectly legal to homeschool in NJ and in order to be approved you only need to present the title of the class and the textbook(s) used. (Note that I’m not a homeschool advocate, but this situation is so insane it sounds like the healthier possible option. And apparently, there’s no deadline. You can just inform the principal and the district, and request she be allowed to continue participating in after-school activities. While a district isn’t prohibited from refusing, you can consult with homeschooling parents or find activities in the area if it’s a wealthy area. You can also harness homeschooling parents’ collective voice to defend your daughter’s right to participate in whatever activities she qualified for or is interested in within her public school.)
More systematically: if enough parents do this won’t there be repercussions for the school district? Questions asked? Wouldn’t this be the equivalent of the district-wide 'test walk-outs" that happened in various states, and caused scrutiny into the curricula and approaches of said tests?
When other parents see that the “rat eat rat race” produces the same results as homeschooling and personal reading, won’t there be backlash? Wouldn’t that cause more parents to wonder about what they’re inflicting their kids?
In fact, wouldn’t TheGFG’s daughter have an excellent cause to advocate - education change at the district level- and opportunity to change thousands of kids lives, with supporters, Board meetings, newspaper conferences, etc, everything that would help her define herself in ways school doesn’t, and really make her stand out compared to all the poor kids stuck in the hamster wheel of the “rat eat rat race”?
2 hours of homework is far in excess of what my Catholic elementary school expected. While my second grade homework was more than 0 hours…it was of the amount that I could easily finish them while watching Woody Woodpecker between 2:30 pm - 3 pm and concentrating mainly on Woody’s cartoon antics. 
However, the amount of homework I received in elementary and junior high school was far less than what my older relatives or many international students received…though it wasn’t 2 hours. Probably more like an hour and change and required much more concentration to the point doing it while watching afterschool cartoons wouldn’t have worked so well unless one was a genuine highly gifted genius type.
When they felt like telling us young’uns about “What I did when I was your age stories”, they kept reminding us that their school days were not only a bit longer than the average American K-12 school day, but they also had to go to school 6 days a week…including full day Saturdays*. I have heard them tell similar stories to young’uns who grew up in the ROC(Taiwan) about how they had it “easy” once they reduced the saturday to a half-day sometime in the 'late '60s or '70s.
- It is also my understanding most students outside the US have far longer school years and don't have the lengthy summer break we have here. That's one thing relatives living in East Asia were somewhat envious regarding their American relatives/counterparts.
^However, this isn’t the 60’s and this isn’t Taiwan. This is the 21st century and New Jersey.
That older people want to talk about walking to school up a hill both ways won’t surprise anyone. However it doesn’t really matter for today’s kids.
I also note that your own competitive parents and school didn’t follow the craziness that this school district (and others like it) have internalized.
I asked my kid about prelabs and she says they have a worksheet to fill out before the lab. It is outrageous to exclude a kid from performing the lab. Probably grounds for a lawsuit but I don’t think that would be helpful. Yes, I’d probably pull my kid out and find another alternative, either just for this class or for the entire schooling. It sounds like the school isn’t at all interested in helping the kids with these issues. They probably schedule the ECs during the school day not just to ensure that the kids perform well but also to make sure the kids have a time to do it if they are in tutoring and weekend schools, when would they meet?
I was going to suggest that your daughter film some of what is going on. Could be used to make a case to the school board, or make a documentary about the pressures on young people and how out of control parents and school districts are causing a mental health crisis.
What bothers me is that the school board did not respond to the parents’ concerns. The BOE’s reaction was almost identical to that of the BOE in the article I posted upthread about another NJ district. Basically, the answer was to tell parents not to enroll their kids in AP’s if they felt the workload was too much for their kids. They refused to acknowledge that it’s a problem of an extreme workload, not incapable kids or coddling parents. Also, as I had mentioned previously, the problem extends far beyond AP’s. There is excessive HW in the lower grades as well. And in the high school, as I also had pointed out, regular classes like health are getting ridiculous too.
@TheGFG - is it not possible that those two BOEs’ reactions were also based on data, just from different families? I know in my own district, that if you ask different populations, you will get very different opinions on workload. We had a “crowd” of parents who didn’t like workload in one AP class, and it turned out that they were all parental overrides into that class. As soon as their kids were properly placed, the problem went away.
In this vein, I support one of the reforms referred to in the thread’s title, i.e. the removal of the parental override option into Honors/AP. Then, when kids are placed into an advanced course, the teachers and administration bear responsibility for figuring out how they will succeed. (And remember, we have to define success not just as getting the coveted grade.)
I know you might not think this is fair, but my take when you say “everyone” is that you probably represent a group, but probably not “everyone.”
I wanted to say something about the Health class. I’ve always believed, even back when I was in high school, that Health and Driver’s Ed and similar courses are actually among the most important, most significant classes anyone will take in life, and I welcome rigor in those classes. You referred to an idealized Health class back in the day when smart kids could snooze their way through and get a high grade, but I think this is a real loss of opportunity to learn about some very important topics for a young adult.
" I know in my own district, that if you ask different populations, you will get very different opinions on workload." Yes, I have seen this also. I have heard parents talking about how their kids were freaking out and staying up until all hours studying for this or that big scary test. And I wouldn’t have heard a word about it from my kid. Then I’d ask my kid about it and she’d say, oh that, yes I studied for 20 minutes. No matter where you set the difficulty level this is going to be a problem as kids who aren’t really up to it will be pushed in by anxious parents or by school districts wanting to puff up their AP participation rate or whatever.
^But the problem isn’t whether people complain. It’s that ALL kids’ health is affected by standards that have no relationship to what is expected at any high school or college in the US. Even the kids whose parents willingly participate suffer.
Also, the climate means there is no such thing as “bearing responsibility for figuring out how the students will succeed”. The school doesn’t exist to promote student success. The school doesn’t exist to facilitate learning. It’s been subverted from its purpose as a public school.
Upthread, it was explained that the students get into the class through a selective process. They’re all capable to taking the class; that some are prevented from taking the lab OR are chastised for making mistakes, which are essential to learning science, shows how insane this school has become.
This discussion sounds to me exactly like a discussion about school districts which have aggressive athletic programs that are dangerous for kids. If a parent posted, “My child’s soccer/football/hockey coach demands that players participate in drills that are dangerous for concussions/dehydration,” nobody would be saying, “It’s the parents’ choice! Some parents want their kids to be in demanding sports programs! Look at the great sports results the teams are getting, and the lucrative scholarships!” We don’t, or at least shouldn’t, want schools to run dangerous athletic programs so some kids can get college scholarships.
We’d tell the parent to remove their child from the program, but we would realize that wasn’t the answer. Schools should not run programs that are dangerous for children, even if parents ask for them, and even if some kids get good results from the programs. That’s true for athletics, and equally true for academics. Schools have no business running academic programs that result in many students getting four hours of sleep a night, and many students becoming dangerously depressed. They should not run those programs even if parents clamor for them, even if the programs have good college-acceptance results for some students. Schools should not be in the business of abusing children so some children get accepted to good colleges.
I think you have to be careful with phrasing like “chastised for making mistakes” - surely one of the functions of a school/class/teacher is to accurately assess student work.
Regarding the prelabs, most schools have some form of prelab in science classes. I’m not yet convinced that it’s such a bad thing (though it sure sounds inconvenient) to postpone completing a lab until the student demonstrates readiness/safety. It didn’t sound like there was even any grade penalty (?) but I don’t know.
So much of this is colored by the slant of the reporter. Suppose instead the parent had reported, “My daughter tried to prepare, but ultimately wasn’t ready for what the lab would cover. Thank goodness, the teacher had a failsafe in place to make sure that no one would get hurt, and so when my daughter failed the prelab, she was given a chance to catch up on other work in that class period, with her friend, instead of doing the lab. Meanwhile, she was given an extension to complete the lab, and the teacher even offered to meet her after school, to make sure it would happen within a couple of weeks.”
Just interesting, does THECFG daughter plan to be a science major/pre-med or all these lab APs just to beef up GPA and compete for class rank?
Actually, with the exception of over-the-top silliness like requiring taking and passing pre-lab quizzes before one’s even allowed to participate in learning how to perform a science laboratory experiment or students in the top of the class participating in afterschool/weekend/summer prep sessions in order to take the same class in the year for an A*, the academic pressure described by OP is very similar to that of my STEM-centered magnet.
Most HS classmates taking APs with the exception of the genuine genius types were known to stay up till 3-4 am and even academic “slackers” like yours truly routinely stated up till 1-2 am just to keep our heads above academic water.
However, unlike OP where this issue is districtwide across all public schools, the students at my public magnet made an affirmative choice to attend knowing that some of the craziness described by OP was PRECISELY ONE OF THE THINGS WE SIGNED UP FOR when we accepted the admissions offer to the HS.
And some of my HS teachers reminded us of that fact by telling us that if we felt the academic requirements/workload was “too much/competitive”, we were free to transfer back to our zoned/neighborhood high schools.
OP’s case here is worse as 1.) Most of the students/families likely didn’t sign up for the over-the-top craziness and 2.) There’s no opt-out to a “non-crazy option” like there was with myself and other students at my public magnet if we felt we’ve had enough of the craziness.
I agree with OP that this is one crucial point that needs to be challenged and reformed…
- When I attended HS, peer pressure would have been such as to strongly discourage this practice. Students took summer courses for the same reasons some of my college classmates did....to be able to take the next advanced course in the sequence...not so they can take the same course for an easy A.
Seriously Fretful? You think excluding a kid from a lab because they failed a pre-lab test is the answer? At this point all of the kids are in the class. How is taking a test on concepts, not lab technique, going to keep anyone safe. This kid is now two labs behind.
There will always be kids that study for 20 minutes and do fine. There are also kids that could study for 20 minutes and do fine, but chose to study for two hours. But there are also schools or at least classes within certain high schools where the kid that normally would do great studying for a half-hour, has to study a lot more.
In our district the top students did a lot of work because there was a lot assigned. The study 20 minute kids may get 5s on the APs and 800s on the subject tests, and even As on in-class tests, with little effort, but are not getting As in the class without a lot more work.
They sound similar to most HS classmates I had when I attended. Only thing was because of the highly restrictive eligibility requirements to take AP classes when I attended HS, many non-AP kids had no trouble getting 4-5s on AP exams by self-studying the exam format and using course material from their non-AP courses a few months or even weeks before the exam date.