<p>"F's usually indicate a complete failure to even show up for class or turn in assignments. Most professors aren't going to fail a kid first semester freshman year who is making a good faith effort. But, if the "team" and the partying took precedence....."</p>
<p>65 to 70% of my son's Freshman physics classes were washed out either with Fs or Ws. The homework and exams were brutal and many kids that did put in a lot of effort still didn't make it. Definitely a weeder course. RateMyProfessor.com is a must in choosing courses and professors if you need a recovery semester.</p>
<p>^^Yes,yes, yes. As I posted earlier, my S2 also experienced failure this first semester and has a huge hole to dig out of. His schedule for Spring semester is filled entirely with profs that got great reviews on Rate My Professor. It is a great resource esp. for new students who don't know the ropes yet. My neice, a second yr. grad student, told S2 she put together her schedule every semster of undergrad based on Rate My Prof. reviews. </p>
<p>MomB, My S2 was very naive about how much he could skip or miss without having dire consequences. He was truly surprised at one of the classes he failed. He passed all but one of the tests (not a's or b's but passed) and just didn't get how important it was to go to every class and do the little assignments too. They were told they would receive emails at mid-term if they were failing any classes. He didn't receive any emails so figured his "happy go lucky" approach (which was basically how he did high sch.)was working out OK. It's hard lesson to learn.</p>
<p>PackMom - My S1 definitely sounds like your S2! I'm sure his naive and easy going attitude also got him into trouble. After receiving okay mid-term reports, I'm sure he thought he could skim by easily...despite everything we kept telling him! He's always been a VERY responsible young man (as the oldest of 3 siblings), so I don't think drinking too much is what actually happened, but I don't want to be too naive on the other hand because anything in college life is possible. Neither his coaches nor us as his parents saw any indication of alcohol abuse in that manner at any time. Not attending classes and bare minimal work is most likely the case, but oh soooooo stupid on his part! I know he is totally blown away and in shock by these turn of events...an extremely hard lesson that not only HE has to endure, but that we will need to do so as well...emotionally, financially, and in dealing with three impressionable teenagers right behind him, S2 heading off to college in September! We have already sat down and had a serious discussion with him about learning from his brother's naive and incorrect assumptions!</p>
<p>If it makes you feel better, S3 pretty much failed all his classes this semester, his first. He did manage to do ok in his PE class! (basketball ironically). For him I think it was a combo of poor time management, poor study skills, missing too many classes (early morning) and probably too much partying.
Husband figures it was a like an $8000 vacation for him on our dime. Luckily it was a state school. He is now home, will be looking for a job and attending community college.And I am going to have to try very hard not to revert back to the old role of nagging him and hovering over him.</p>
<p>I think your post should be somehow put out there so parents of next years freshman athletes are drawn to it. Your situation is not an isolated case and although we as parents can only do so much it helps to know what our kids are up against and what to look for in order to help guide them in the right direction.
My son is also a freshman college athlete at a D1 program. His school does require up to 6 hours of study hall /week for all freshman as well as any upperclassman that have a 2.5 or less. His school also requires all freshman athletes to take a class about college adjustment, study habits and organization. Not sure how much this has helped him as according to him the class was a waste of time but my bet is that it helped more than he let's himself realize.<br>
Parent's of to be college athletes should check to see what their particular school offers in this regard.
We also suggested to our son that he take a lighter and easier load his first semester so that his adjustment would be a little easier. Still, I know that at the end of the semester he was working very hard to pull it all together because of things like skipping class and not totally understanding the cumulative nature of college classes.<br>
His next semester will be more challenging since he will also be participating in a sport and his class load will be fuller and more difficult. My hope is that he learned something in the first semester that will help carry him through the next one.
I do know of others that have been in your situation and please be assured that if your son wants to follow through with college and basketball he does have the opportunity to do just that. It will take some sacrifice and hard work on his part but he can make this right.<br>
Like others have said, he needs to revisit what he did so he knows what he did wrong and from there he can move forward. Keep your chin up--he will be ok.</p>
<p>Bec5656 - I wish you much luck. I hope my S1 can pull it together, or else he will also be home, working and attending CC. My heart is still breaking...after all you do for a child...but like you, I need to move past that and not nag either...going to take some REAL effort on my part!</p>
<p>Nikkistar - I am new to this website and do not know how to put it "out there" as you mentioned, or as a "separate thread" as someone else mentioned. Maybe a senior member could lend a hand here. I am totally in awe of all the responses I have gotten and I appreciate each and every one. Although I knew we could not possibly be the first for this to happen to, it is helpful to hear from others with the same experience and the advise has been great. Unfortunately, none of my friends have had to experience this unpleasant disappointment and pain.</p>
<p>My S1 is not at a D1, but rather in a D3 program. When he was being recruited (D3=NO scholarship monies received) I knew there was much better support systems in place for college athletes at all the private schools looking at him; however we don't have the funds to be able to send 4 kids to private colleges and had to choose the state school. There will now be services available to him, it's just shame that it had to come to this point and for him to miss out for the remainder of this basketball season...which really, at this point is so NOT relevant as is his academic progress.</p>
<p>Believe me, it is taking a huge effort on my part to try to distance myself and not nag! Even during Xmas break he has been doing not much but hanging out with friends, staying out late and sleeping in. His excuse is that all his friend are home for Xmas break so he wants to see them while they are here. Yea, and none of those friends flunked out of first semester! They have good reason to relax and have fun.
I hope this was a good wake up call to your son MomB. He must have worked so hard to be able to play basketball at the college level, I can imagine how disappointing that would be if it doesn't work out.</p>
<p>MomB - my son played D3 lacrosse and his first semester freshman year was a wake up call for him too. The school had study halls/study skills time in place. He just failed to show up a few times. When S registered freshman year he signed a paper that allowed the school to contact us, and report his progress to us. Mid-term freshman year, we got a call from the Coach telling us S wasn't going to mandatory study halls.
Lets just say - we had a reading of the minutes and put the ball back into his court.
He knew summer school was NOT an option since his summer job was his living money during the school year. Started with 1.8 - ended up graduating with 3.01, what he needed to graduate with his degree in education.</p>
<p>Sophomore year the loan went into his name and we were no longer co-signers. We told him - you want to party - carry on...it's your dime.</p>
<p>He is now a high school social studies teacher and often remarks about how stupid he was and how he could've graduated with honors.</p>
<p>"Even during Xmas break he has been doing not much but hanging out with friends, staying out late and sleeping in."</p>
<p>Two of our son's textbooks arrived yesterday and I left them on his desk. He picked one of them up and started reading it last night. He will have read through all of his assigned textbooks by the beginning of the semester. I also printed out the texts for three math courses from MIT OCW for him to read and he's finished one.</p>
<p>In general, he knows about 70% of the material for his courses before they start. This greatly reduces the pressure and stress during the semester when there is a given amount of time for a given amount of work. The only way to reduce the pressure is to do work ahead of time. Absorption of the material is much better as the outline and details have been seen before so there is less pressure to cram during the semester.</p>
<p>It's a very simple thing to do and I run into people that use this approach from time to time but I think that very few (in percentage terms) take this approach. It is really a part of time management but it is time management outside of the defined semester.</p>
<p>Yea I was thinking the same thing. I had a hard enough time convincing my son he needed to buy the textbook and read at all! The reading ahead concept...forget it.</p>
<p>I have son with same situation. D1 athlete who didn't do as well as expected. In his case, it is likely due to never having developed study skills needed for college. He was able to do very well in HS without these skills, but not with combo of harder classes and sports practices,etc.... Some of you mentioned improving study skills and organization - did your kids learn this thru the school, something you did at home during break (BCEagle idea sounds like a good one),.....? Just looking for ideas on how we can help him get off on right foot in second semester with study skills and time mgmt.</p>
<p>"Just looking for ideas on how we can help him get off on right foot in second semester with study skills and time mgmt."</p>
<p>I'm reminded of that movie line in Cool Hand Luke: "What we have here is a failure to communicate." Good study skills and time management take years to develop. There is no six week course that will turn F's into A's. Think about it from the reverse side. What would be an appropriate response if some straight A nerd with no game came up to a recruited athlete and asked for ideas on how he might make the ball team?</p>
<p>That said, it's really up to the student to "fix" the problem. It does appear that a common theme in the many success stories posted above is that the student got motivated to start getting A's.</p>
<p>q1spa - my daughter is not an athlete, but a dancer. Time management and study skills were taught at her school from 6-8 eight grade, then reinforced in HS. A lot of new kids that entered her school in 9th grade were tutored privately for those skills in order to keep up the demand of schoolwork/sports (every student was required to play a sport after school). I think some kids are just better at it, but it is a learned skill. If your son is having problem with organization or time management, it may pay to get a tutor for him.</p>
<p>Many colleges have study skills websites with hints and tips on time management, note taking, reading textbooks, etc. Here's an example from Dartmouth:</p>
<p>It can be hard to learn this on-the-fly during a semester without a coach showing you how to use organizational systems and explaining how and why they work.</p>
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I thought I had stumbled into the MegaThread!
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<p>Oops, make that the Meta-thread (although it's grown large enough to be called mega..)</p>
<p>Seriously, though, hats off to any kid who has that kind of motivation. Sometimes it's a struggle to get my S to open a textbook at all, let alone read it before the semester starts.</p>
<p>Yes, that would mean the kid would have to actually buy the book. My S1 (not the one who failed ,that was S2) is a Dean's List student but has not bothered to buy the book for several classes over the years. </p>
<p>He has been disgusted more than a few times by the high cost of required books that never get used so he has learned (a senior this year) to figure out in the first couple of weeks whether the book will really be required or not.</p>