<p>Another milestone reached here today - DD completed the last final exam of her high school career! At her school, seniors don't have to take 2nd semester finals for most classes, unless their semester grade is below a B or they have too many absences. I was curious if this is a common practice in high schools. I think full-blown senioritis will kick in now...</p>
<p>Nope. 
And none of D’s classes had finals for first semester. Although they have to take their AP exams in the spring. There is also no grade or absence limit.</p>
<p>in IL too… just AP exams in May, no finals :)</p>
<p>No finals at the end of the school year here for seniors. I remember when I was in high school we tried to petition the school to allow seniors to not have to take finals. It didn’t work.</p>
<p>Yes. I can’t believe so many of your kids get out of them. What’s the thinking there?</p>
<p>My son’s HS has “senior option”. If you have an A average, you are exempted from finals… That’s a pretty good incentive to avoid senioritis…</p>
<p>YDS–at our school it’s kind of pointless. By finals time the kids have all been accepted into college, grades are set for the most part, the AP tests have come and gone, there really isn’t much to do the last month of school after the AP tests anyway. They OFFER the tests if someone wants to take them, no one really does.</p>
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<p>same policy here so that kids continue to strive for A’s…One exception is for 1 semester classes that you get an A in 1st semester you can also get exempt from those finals</p>
<p>I like the policy</p>
<p>At D’s school if you took AP exams no finals. Also no finals in classes with a B or better and less then 4 sick days. </p>
<p>Was really a good thing for D because after AP exams she was pretty brain dead.</p>
<p>Our Jr’s and Sr’s who have As all four quarters are exempt from the final in June. So, you could easily have an A for the year, but if you got a very high B+ second quarter you’re taking that final. Most still end up preparing for it anyway as the teachers purposely don’t reveal 4th quarter grades until a day or two prior to finals. A few teachers don’t observe this policy and require a final in their course, no exceptions.</p>
<p>All seniors took finals regardless of AP credit at our HS.</p>
<p>No finals unless too many absences - only AP’s</p>
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Same at my daughter’s HS – no finals for seniors with an ‘A’ in the course. :)</p>
<p>Everyone takes finals here. School runs into June, so there are several weeks of classes after AP tests, and they do teach more/have projects, etc.</p>
<p>Our’s is like blueiguana’s. No finals for jr’s or sr’s if they have an A or A- average each of the previous 4 terms. And apparently the administration doesn’t tell them until right before finals. Although now they have a system where you can see their grades online on a weekly basis - all individual grades and cumulative for the term. So I assume they would pretty much know on their own before. And no finals if you take an AP course and take the exam (which is a requirement).</p>
<p>Midterm grades are not averaged into the quarterly grades. Usually midterms and finals count as a “5th” quarter - so each are worth 10% of your annual grade. So I think that means if you don’t take a final then your midterm would be worth 20% of your annual grade! Must be why my DD14 is feeling so much pressure these midterms! Her goal is to not have any finals to take this spring! Plus they’ve changed the midterms (and presumably the finals) to be much more writing and very few objective questions (T/F, multiple choice, etc.) They’re a lot more analysis and short answers for most of the tests!</p>
<p>Wow, my kids will be jealous. Definitely finals here. Sometimes a particular teacher will let a student with an A for the year avoid it, but that depends on the teacher and it happens in all grades. Their finals do start before the underclassmen, and they are out a few days earlier, but that’s it.
Most of the classes don’t make them do midterms, though, so for the moment they are happy about that and not thinking that far forward.</p>
<p>We have Graduation Memorial Day weekend, Finals are not until first week/June</p>
<p>Same at our school ldavis. Seniors get out of school a week before everyone else!</p>
<p>Our kids had end of senior year exams but they were held before finals week. During finals week, the seniors practiced for graduation 1 or 2 days but didn’t have to attend school on the others.</p>
<p>Our HS is on a block schedule so students complete a class in one semester for a year’s worth of credit. Each semester has 3 periods- so for example, my son took Spanish 3 his 1st semester of Jr. year and Spanish 4 2nd semester of Jr. year. Seniors here take finals both semesters in senior year, since most classes are only 1 semester long.</p>