<p>Warbrain , her school has 7 periods</p>
<p>Seems to me the GC is looking out for her, trying to explain, going forward.</p>
<p>If health and geog are normally paired over a school year (one semester of each) and she already has the health credits, yes, it leaves a gap.<br>
But there are no core classes available for one semester. Hence, Teacher’s Aide. (And plenty of schools have that role- just not usually for freshmen. It’s better when they can actually help other students in a more challenging class, that they already took and did well in. Not just a time filler.) It can be on the transcript, it depends on the hs. It can be credit or no credit. </p>
<p>TA, as the “busy” option, is not as good as a core. That’s why a poster made the comment that this messes things up. BUT, all this shouldn’t necessarily have started about making room for an “elective.” Many kids start summer school early in hs to make room for, say, advancing in math classes. Or to get a jump on foreign language, so the junior and senior schedules can be advanced. Not to fit in forensics.</p>
<p>I believe the counselor is saying, this false start throws a wrench in (which we all agree on.) I’d say, go ahead and do the TA thing. But now look at the soph schedule and see if that year will be more smooth- and more challenging. </p>
<p>And rising freshman is a bit early to be worrying about Ivies. </p>
<p>I agree with looking forward about this.</p>
<p>Beyond that, it seems to me that there are multiple components of the problem, some with the school and some with the academic differences with the family’s home country.</p>
<p>The following items are just my opinion, but</p>
<p>1) If a school offers 7 periods, I don’t really believe that a student needs to be taking classes all 7 periods in order to have a strong academic experience. If the school thinks so, then there are several possibilities:<br>
a) Something is injecting an element of artificiality into the academic climate. Perhaps the family lives in a state where students are ranked county-wide, and there is some bonus for having 7 classes (or even more, with online additions)
b) The classes themselves are not very demanding, so 7 is a reasonable course load.
QMP’s high school had only 6 periods. This was not limiting, in terms of college admissions. </p>
<p>2) Zero-hour is an infernal invention. It flies in the face of all of the research about sleep needs and sleep schedules for teenagers. It is great for people who happen to have short sleep needs, or who happen to be early birds by nature, but it is misery on the other side of the sleep spectrum. In my opinion, people who are learning difficult things may tend to need more sleep than those whose daily activities are less demanding. I know there are some counter-examples of people who thrive on 4 hours of sleep a day, but I am not sure that is sustainable in the long run.</p>
<p>3) It seems as though concern about the possibility of getting a B figured into the decision to drop the course, in some way. In any event, there does appear to be concern about getting a B. American high schools are so different from high schools that really focus on academics (as in many other countries) that this is a really misplaced concern. The way that American grading goes, a student may sometimes be unable to get an A, despite excellent understanding of the course material and a strong work ethic. (Group projects. “Participation” grades. Other elements of subjective evaluation.) If the combination of ranking issues and grade inflation leads to an unhealthy concern with a “zero-defect” approach to the high school transcript, that is a prescription for real unhappiness. Been there. Served as Club President. Designed the T-shirt.</p>
<p>In some schools, the teachers will look out for the interests of academically talented students. My teachers did so, to a degree that I have not seen much at all elsewhere, or later on. In some schools now, the academically talented students are essentially left to fend for themselves. The school in question appears to be one of those. A telling comment by the guidance counselor was that the only semester-long courses <em>offered to freshmen</em> are Health and World Geography. This strongly suggests that there are semester-long courses available for upper classmen, but that freshmen just won’t be admitted to those. If it is an issue of academically justified pre-requisites, that is one thing. But it might simply be exclusionary.</p>
<p>I don’t think being a TA is going to hurt a 9th grader. As far as upsetting the counselor… at least at our public high school the counselors don’t spend much time with most of the kids anyway. They need to spend their time on the kids that are having trouble staying in school not the ones that are college bound. So once your daughter starts high school I doubt you/she will have much contact with the counselor. </p>
<p>QuantMech: yes, you are correct - the concern about the possibility of getting a B was definitely figured into the decision to drop the course. My daughter is a straight"A" student . There would be plenty of possibilities for her to take real difficult AP courses in the future , where she may or may not be able to get an “A”.</p>
<p>This Geography course is not a Geo course at all. It is a History course that students learn from their World History textbook. This is a course that is very easy during a normal school year, but as a summer school course it is impossibly difficult (I am not talking about the amount of material, but about the disconnect between the given material and the tests).
So far, there is none there who was able to earn an “A”. I call it a “History gone wrong”,lol </p>
<p>I understand what you are saying about the American grading and the American school system, but the reality is that it is harder and harder for students to get into the College of their choice. We live in CA where even the UC’s are getting harder and harder to get into as California continues in its budget crisis.
The UC’s are admitting fewer in-state students because those from out of state pay more.
You need at least a 4.0 GPA to have a good bet. Problem is, my daughter is not looking to go to just any college, she wants to aim higher and she is going to do a premed, which is getting to be highly competitive. </p>
<p>We know a lot of kids who just graduated . Some applied to UC Berkeley, UCLA, UC San Diego and UC Davis. Did not get into any. They won school awards, had really good grades, wrote great essays, did AP’s
,were athletes, wrote in school paper, were active in school clubs etc…Right now, there seem to be this competitive hysteria around college admission process, I don’t recall it being like that in my time ( although I completed my high school abroad, I graduated from college here, in the US about 30 years ago).</p>
<p>I do understand that there are ways around it and other choices available too.</p>
<p>As far as classes offered in our school - there are no AP classes for freshmen and no outside(online courses) allowed. The impression I get from the school is that they care far more about graduating the failing students than about excellent students like my daughter. </p>
<p>Re: zero: I think OP meant they asked for a null period or study hall, rather than filling the gap with TA. Because there was confusion about the word, “favorable.”</p>
<p>“TA isn’t favorable on her high school transcript” really means it isn’t the preference. As in “giving a result that helps, benefits…” </p>
<p>Not that it is unfavorable, “likely to cause problems or difficulties.” Don’t worry, we native speakers have issues with some people’s word choices, too.</p>
<p>lookinforward , here is the counselor’s words from his original letter : "I don’t recommend taking it during the school year without the Health, because she’ll have to be scheduled as a TA for the other semester, and being a TA isn’t favorable on a transcript if she plans to apply and attend a four year college right out of high school. " </p>
<p>Seems to me that the counselor’s worst mistake was scaring you about the consequences of being a TA. If a kid has a rigorous four year schedule, I don’t think there is a school in the country that will care that among all of the AP and honors classes, there is a semester in which a scheduling issue created some dead space on the transcript - in freshman year, no less. </p>
<p>Is this “Geography” class a requirement? Since you are in CA, the high school graduation requirements for social studies are: “Three courses in social studies, including United States history and geography; world history, culture, and geography; a one-semester course in American government and civics, and a one-semester course in economics.” At S17’s school, the ambitious students take AP World Hist, AP US Hist, AP US Govt, and one of the AP Economics classes to satisfy this requirement. Generally, our students do not take social studies freshman year (because they have a Health/Freshman Seminar combo, where “Freshman Seminar” is a college & career planning class).</p>
<p><a href=“State Minimum High School Graduation Requirements - High School (CA Dept of Education)”>http://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/gs/hs/hsgrmin.asp</a></p>
<p>Oddly, the UC subject requirements for history/social science are less than the high school graduation requirements: “One year of world history, cultures and geography (may be a single yearlong course or two one-semester courses), and one year of U.S. history or one-half year of U.S. history and one-half year of civics or American government”. For example, this would be met by AP World Hist and AP US Hist.</p>
<p><a href=“http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/freshman/requirements/a-g-requirements/”>http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/freshman/requirements/a-g-requirements/</a></p>
<p>Yes, I understand it is a requirement. Everyone must take it.</p>
<p>“Teacher’s assistant”
Yes, I got that part, but I still don’t understand. There are high schools where every period has to be filled with a course or you have to take this “TA” designation and theoretically help with a class? Really? There is no such thing as a study hall?</p>
<p>Planner03: I still am struggling with this phrase from the counselor’s email:"The TA appears on the transcript because the student earns the same credits as they do with all other classes, and 4 year colleges want to see students taking courses, and not assisting teachers in a classroom. " - can someone translate it for me? It looks like he is saying that they are giving a student this TA ,so they can earn a credit for it?</p>
<p>Wait, so your daughter dropped out just because she was worried she might get a B? And the issue is that the text doesn’t match the course? But aren’t they using the exact same text as during the school year? This isn’t making much sense to me. How would it be so much easier using the same book during the school year? And what about all the other coursework and assignments, that wasn’t relevant either? And what about simply getting another geography book to supplement, did you try that? </p>
<p>Did you discuss how the drop out will appear on her transcript? I’d be more worried about that than a “TA”. </p>
<p>" all this shouldn’t necessarily have started about making room for an “elective.” Many kids start summer school early in hs to make room for, say, advancing in math classes. Or to get a jump on foreign language, so the junior and senior schedules can be advanced. Not to fit in forensics."</p>
<p>Speak for yourself. Some kids care about their electives and are willing to go above and beyond regular school expectations to fit in more of them. I don’t see why a kid should only take summer school if it’s to get ahead in the subjects you deem most important. </p>
<p>So he’s not a good writer. Appears on the transcript. That is likely a district policy. Some hs do show it on the transcript, as well as study halls or other items. He’s saying adcoms would rather see she actually took a class. But I think most of us agree this is not a showstopper for college apps. When she’s in fall semester of senior year and has presumably done well, plus engaged in meaningful activities, I doubt adcoms are going to stop and say, “Wait! This one was a TA in 9th.” </p>
<p>But I do think he is clearly frustrated that they allowed her to take this combo in summer school, in order to accommodate some other classes in 9th grade- and you altered that. In most cases, you do need to stay on the good side of your GC. I hope this was not about dropping it to avoid a B. Or other pressures on a kid who hasn’t even started hs.</p>
<p>mathyone, In the perfect logical world the course should be exactly the same during the school year. I thought just like you before I actually looked into how this course is done.
The issue is not that the test does not mach the text.
The issue is that this is the only “independent study” course during the high school summer time. It is the only course that has no instructions, it is given out by the football coach, who clearly does not know the material and can’t tell the kids exactly what they need to study. For all other summer high school classes students have to show up every day and have a regular class,taught by a teacher, but not for this “Independent” Health/Geo combo.</p>
<p>During the school year the material is the same, but they actually have lessons, given by a teacher in a form of a lecture or a class. All the kids who took this class during the school year say that it is a super easy class. So, the difference is in clear instructions and lectures. </p>
<p>How would you do if you were told to study ancient world and italian renaissance, but were given test on France or Japan? It is not possible to study egnouph for something like that. </p>
<p>So, to answer your question - no, my daughter did not drop out just because she was worried she might get a B, she dropped out because of the family health matter, but once we started that conversation in the summer school office , she refused to do this course over again next summer (because of the reasons above) .
We were told by another counselor that my daughter has an A on her first test and this will show on her transcript, but it would not look bad , because it’s an A. if she were to do this summer course next summer this A will not show on her transcript , only her final grade… as i said before no other student got an final “A” yet for this course</p>
<p>Re zero hour: At the local school, this was a period before first hour. It startrd about 6:50 am. I think other schools use this terminology, too. Some of the administrators seemed to relish it. Fortunately, it had to be eliminated locally, due to budget cuts.</p>
<p>OP - Keep some documentation on the family health matter although I highly doubt you will need it for college apps.
I really don’t think your DD has any choice but to take the TA course in the fall if she won’t retake it next summer.
Still I would ask if there is other classes she could take instead of the TA course in the fall. Some sort of class that the instructor would be fine with her only taking for the fall. For example is she currently in Band? maybe there is a different type of Band class like Jazz Band that she could do for a semester? Fine Arts instructors at least in our school are pretty easy to get along with and would go out of their way to help.</p>
<p>But OP said they asked for a “zero period” and the context is both this missing course in her semester and OP’s concern being a TA would be “unfavorable” on apps (which I think is a misinterpretation- “not favorable” means “not the preferred path.” That’s different.) Coming to school earlier (one use of “zero hour”) wouldn’t seem to solve this particular problem.</p>
<p>“She won’t be scheduled for zero period PE to complete the course.”</p>
<p>I think maybe they were trying to take a different PE course in zero period to fill the requirement?</p>
<p>Just saying, she also said, “We asked for zero period, but it is unknown if her counselor is even going to let my daughter take zero period.” Some of OP’s flow is a little confusing, But we all seem to agree- except OP- that she isn’t going to be aced out of a good college for this one hangnail. She just needs to play her cards right, going forward.</p>