You do need to do something besides school, study and sleep. I completely agree that you should go to your counselor. Your mom has some trust issues. And ideally your counselor would call your mom and try to help come up with a solution.
Should that fail, other ideas I had:
Your mom must have 1-2 days off of work a week--could you do a volunteer activity on that day of the week?
National Science Fair or Google Science Fair--go to your favorite science teacher and ask if they could mentor you for one of these activities. There are many kinds of science experiments and not all need done with high-tech equipment.
What about creating a fitness regimen of your own, such as biking or running. Keep a journal. There are occasionally community 5k events you could sign up for. They are often a lot of fun.
Babysitting, petsitting, mowing lawns or shoveling snow-- if you are truly sitting at home and have finished your homework on a Friday night or Saturday afternoon, go earn some money now.
If you love music, you could save up for either a guitar or an electric keyboard. There are tons of Youtube videos to learn from for free.
Maybe it is too early because you are a freshman but why would your mom get angry about something like that if you let her know the plan? Maybe start by talking about that and about it being important for your to also be involved in your school community.
You can do things on your own and at home. Projects that interest you. Extra learning too about things you are interested in. Also you can look up some citizen science things to get involved in. Some can be done online.
I’m super curious how you are supposed to get to work and back.
[I am a school of choice kid so she already drives me to the bus stop in the morning and I walk home in the afternoon, but my hs is in an extremely wealthy area.<<
[/QUOTE]
It seems to me that your mother has gone to some effort to ensure that you are at a top school so that you can have better opportunities that might otherwise be available to you. Therefore, it seems strange to me that she would be unwilling to consider reasonable suggestions to incorporate some good ECs into your day.
OP, make sure your mother understands the importance of ECs to you. They are not just for your resume, they are important to your development as an interesting and productive human being. Attending the best high school in the world will not make up for the lack of such activities in your life at this critical stage, and her efforts to put you into that school will amount to very little if you cannot enrich your personality and character with activities outside the classroom.
If you are an in-state resident of Michigan and you have good grades with lots of AP classes and high test scores then you could still very well get into the University of Michigan without any ECs.
With that said ECs help a lot and I would second what everyone else here said. You need to talk to your mom or counselor or some other trusted adult and work this situation out.
Thank you everyone for your suggestions. Yearbook isn’t an option due to a personal conflict I had with the teacher, but the newspaper is in school and out of school. My mom has NO days off during the week in the spring, summer, fall, and some of the Winter. I have already tried discussing being involved to her since I was in 7th gradeand obviously that’s worked. I even said to her that community college may be my only option if she doesn’t budge, she seemed completely fine with me going to community college. Which I don’t understand, since she wants me to move out quick like she did. She said she would be fine with getting me a car, but that would mean I make the insurance payments, pay for gas, etc. At first she wanted me to pay for most of the car, but she wasn’t aware that 14 - 15 year olds don’t really get hired anywhere.
My counselor seemed like she wanted to avoid talking to my mom, which I can understand. She suggested for me to join the leadership program, but I don’t think that will be something I enjoy. I do reside in Michigan, but I’m in a suburb.
There are no clubs that meet during lunch. I got to a few French club meetings in October when she got out of work in time, but she said she doesn’t want to deal with the traffic on my school’s road so shes done with driving me. She kind of confuses me, because she said you can find your own ride home. Which I cannot, my friends are fed up with me asking for rides with me providing nothing in return, and I have no other family members that live nearby. I also don’t live in the direction of any of my friends, which I guess is the perks of being a school of choice kid.
I’m not extremely picky on what I would like to do, but Spanish club and Health Science club are the only clubs that meet my interests. French club was fun though, I would love to be in it again. V.I.P and Quiz bowl didn’t seem too bad either.
To all the grammar natzi’s
My spelling isn’t wonderful, but I am on a tablet, which means typing is a challenge. If you want to be that way with me you’d be surprised. I actually earned an A in English 9 without putting forth any effort last quarter. This quater the teacher and the student teacher are only working with and giving the good grades to their favorite students. Which means the majority of us aren’t exceling. I have notfied administration and they were appalled by this immature behaviour, but since I came to them early they agreed to switch me at the semester, my fellow peers may not be so lucky. In other words I will be stuck with the dreaded B this quarter. My counselor does want me to go to H. American Literature next year.
Sadly its just going backwards with her. I want to go to French Club again and she has her rare (less rare in the winter) days off on some of their meeting days. She is just finding every excuse she can to not let me go. Ex- She doesn’t feel like taking me back home, doesn’t feel like paying the pay to particapate. She just expects me to handle it all. It is frustrating. We are not poor by any means, she just sees no purpose behind it. I tried explaning to her about what it takes to be admitted to a university and she just ignores me or starts swearing at me. She wants nothing to do with school. I can’t go back to French Club until she signs the sheet and writes a $25 check. I tried giving them my own money but the letter demanded a check.
Online sounds like the best way to go about an EC.
So learning a skill or a culture can be counted as an EC. Some kids spend their time learning on EDX or Coyrsera. All or at least most is completely free.
You like french club so you could use your free time to learn french and discuss/learn french culture (it doesn’t have to be Napoleon Bonaparte; it could be today’s culture).
I like Korean culture and some people have learned it and translate Korean music or TV shows in English during their free time.
Some people like coding and learn a language. They later on work on software/open projects with others.
Some people are fanatic bloggers. It could be about their life or just someone else/a topic. I know a friends of mine learned HTML just to have her own customized tumblr layout. Popular blogs require networking skills.
Most of my examples require leadership and collaboration. you can do this on your own time and for free if you’re dedicated.(well if you have Internet)
Talk to the teacher who is the advisor for the French Club. Perhaps the school can waive the fee for you. I don’t know where you live, or whether the school sponsors this particular club, but in some places asking students to pay for clubs can be an ACLU violation.
Wait, your counselor suggested you enter the leadership program and you declined because you don’t think you’ll enjoy it? I would grab that and give it a try for at least 3 months. Trying something new is part of why colleges want you to do ECs.
Also, regarding the French Club: If the letter demanded a check and you have cash only, please go to your school’s registrar or bursar and ask to pay cash in person, and get a receipt. If this is not allowed, explain to your counselor. Cash only is common in some of our immigrant cultures, and should not be held against a student.
You could stay after class in your school, try to do something with your teachers. For example, I am quite upset I did not think of this earlier (I am a senior.) I recently started a class. Yes, you heard that right. I started my very own class with permission from a teacher. He is letting me design it and allowing me to invite others to join. So far, I have 3 students altogether This number may or may not grow because this started second semester, very recently. It is hard to get people to leave their current schedules, as they are probably fixed, but even then, I did it lol. Just trying to show you that before I started it, I thought nobody would join because their schedules are already fixed, but look at it now. I have 3 people; 3 people more than I thought I would have. Just start something and go ahead with it full steam.
BTW, my school isnt ghetto or anything, allowing me to make my own class. The teacher is still the one ultimately deciding the grades and stuff. He just trusts me with making the curriculum lol.
@Picapole I looked over the application, it demands a lot more then I could ever do in my situation. Even if I applied for it anyway I’d have to stay in it for closer to 5 months. It’s too late to apply. Instead, I sent in an application for the school newspaper, I don’t have to take it, but I have the teacher who runs it for English 9 next semester, so I can find out then how much it demands. I’m hoping I can coax my grandpa into coming out to help with transportation. He majored in Telecommunications in college at MSU, but lives quite far from me.
Shes getting all these random Tuesdays off now. I will try to pick up French Club again at the semester and Quiz Bowl. My Spanish 2 teacher, who runs Quiz Bowl, invited me to join at the semester. Our new semester begins 1-26.
@bopper That’s the thing about being a school of choice kid. You live out of the way of everyone, so riding with someone is impossible. Club’s don’t meet during lunch because lunches here are extremely random, and change with the semester. You couldn’t get everyone in the same lunch.