<p>My kids HS didn't used to give mid-terms and exempted all students from finals if they had A's in all quarters. </p>
<p>What they found from surveying the hs grads attending college was that many of them did not feel prepared for college because those high achieving kids had taken maybe one or two finals in their whole school career. Of course, our HS didn't reverse course slowly, they did a complete u-turn and now there are mid-terms and finals in every single class, no exemptions, and this includes gym, heatlh, etc.</p>
<p>I like the idea of seniors being exempt from finals if they maintain A's in the other semesters.</p>
<p>Let us consider a math class. Each chapter teaches a certain technique for solving a particular class of problems. When you take the chapter quiz/test, you automatically know what technique you need to use, you are just tested whether you have master that technique. In the final exam, when you are given a problem, you have to recognize what kind of problem it is, what technique you should choose. You are tested for the gestalt. This is different from your chapter test. That is why final exam should not be exempted.</p>
<p>Hello I am a senior in high school in Connecticut currently. For an AP English assignment, my classmates and myself have been given the task to write up a proposal to administer a change in a policy inside or around our community. For my proposal, I have decided to try and change a policy regarding junior students' excemption from final exams on the basis that they maintain an A average (a 93% or above) through the duration of the course. I was wondering if your school offered any such options to junior students, and what your exam policies were. If you could please write me back with any useful information regarding this subject, it would be greatly appreciated. Thank you so much!</p>
<p>our HS does not offer such an exam plan; instead, they use the instructional days after AP tests for research projects which count for 10-15% of the semester grade (so kids can't slack). Since we don't start until after Labor Day, classes run thru late June so there are 4-5 weeks left of school.</p>
<p>Wow! I learn something new every day. I have never heard of an exam exemption before in my life.</p>
<p>The closest I came was my introductory accounting course in college, where the deal was that if you handed in 90% of the problem sets (one per class session) on time and complete, you were guaranteed a C even if you didn't take the exam (or if you took it and failed it). An A was hard to get -- you had to ace the exam, which wasn't easy. </p>
<p>This course was enormously popular with the football team. It was a great course, too -- one of the best I ever took.</p>
<p>"I'm responding from Massachusetts, and I've never heard of exam exemptions. At my daughters' high school, exams count for 20% of the final grade, for all courses. They are scheduled for the last week of each semester. If a student wants to leave early for the summer, makeups must be rescheduled AFTER the school year, which furthers discourages anyone from missing them. Seniors here finish about three weeks earlier than the rest of the school, and do not take exams."</p>
<p>I'm responding from Ohio. I also have never heard of exam exemptions. At most of the Ohio schools around here, only seniors who have a senior project (usually an internship or a community service project) are done before finals and don't have to take them - they work on senior project for the last three weeks of the school year and do a science fair like presentation of the senior project around finals week. (They need to start the process of approval for the senior project six months early - it is not easy to have the project approved - they have to have a sponsor and be "meaningful")</p>
<p>Other seniors take finals just days before graduation.</p>
<p>going along with other arguments about attendance, you could also argue it discourages kids from missing school for class field trips (needed to enrich the academic experience, seeing Shakespeare performed for instance), or extracurricular field trips (football games, debate tournaments, etc. necessary for becoming a well-rounded individual.)</p>
<p>This topic/discussion/argument just came up in our house tonight. We have lived overseas for many years and my kids - now in 10th and 11th grades - never had exemptions from exams. They had mid-year and end of year exams, altho it was up to the teacher to decide if they were cumulative or not.</p>
<p>Now, back in the US, their new (public, well-respected district) has the following policy:</p>
<p>Freshman - 1 exam per semester
Sophomores - 2 exams per semester
Juniors - 3 exams per semester
Seniors - 4 exams per semester</p>
<p>In all cases, you can only exempt from one exam in each class per year. So, if you opt not to take your math exam in Dec, you must take it in May.</p>
<p>But, the kids must meet the following requirements each semester -
an A and no more than 3 absences
a B and no more than 2 absences
a C and no more than 1 absence</p>
<p>I was arguing "for" the exemptions as more difficult/challenging. My DH was arguing "against" saying it was just an "easy way" to get through the course.
I told him that if we were opting for the "easy way" that we would not have the kids in pre-AP and AP classes. </p>
<p>To be fair - I had not considered the attendance issue. I, too, am against sending sick kids to school and my sons participate in a variety of activities that may require missing some school.</p>
<p>Think I'll pour myself a glass of wine and ponder it some more...........</p>
<p>Wow, I've never heard of this either. At my D's school, there are midterms and finals for almost every class, all the way through. In higher grades those finals can count for up to 40% of your course grade. Attendance isn't part of the grade and plays no role in changing the gradng criteria.</p>
<p>In the case of my Ds school, where every kid goes to college afterwards, they would be greatly disadvantaged at the college level if they were not already very experienced final exam takers. </p>
<p>As a professor, I think final exams for some courses play an important pedagogical role. Studying for finals (and sometimes the taking of finals), requires students to gather, synthesize and hold together an entire course of material (which is quite different than learning the parts separately). Though, of course, not all course material is retained (don't we wish!), but it sure helps with retention, and is extremely useful for developing a deeper understanding, especially needed if one is going to the next level in the topic sequence.</p>
<p>At my school, you're exempt from the final exam (but not the midterm) if it's a full-year course and you have 93+ average without counting the exam, which is 10% of the final grade. No relation at all to attendance--but most people come to school sick anyway because the makeup work is hell.</p>
<p>The final isn't supposed to be cumulative, just the second two marking periods, but some teachers make it cumulative anyway. :/</p>
<p>No exam exemptions whatsoever at our school- 3 term marks, first two term's mark is 1/2 final 1/2 work done, year end mark is 40-60% cumulative final on the year's work. Excellent prep for university</p>
<p>The latest nonsense from our school is that they are now excusing from finals if you did exceptionally well on the state testing in order to motivate the kids to actually put effort in. This all goes back to NCLB and OH regulations which require schools to show continual improvement in the testing. So last year the students who did well on these tests were given final exemptions for up to 2 exams. This only applies to Freshmen and Sophmores since they're the only ones taking those tests.</p>
<p>I evidently lost my typing ability at some point during my original message...... :)</p>
<p>The point I was trying to make to my husband is that I support exemptions if it means that my child could focus his attention on studying for a course that is more difficult/challenging for him than worrying about studying for an exam in a subject he is doing well in. </p>
<p>For example, if my son had his pre-AP Physics exam and pre-AP World Geog exam on the same day.....and if he had a strong A in Geog but was on the A/B borderline in Physics....then I would prefer his energies focused on Physics. Yes - the Geog exam should require less studying, but if it is a comprehensive exam, then it still requires a good bit of review.</p>
<p>Ideally - it would be nice to think that my kids would have started reviewing WELL BEFORE the day before the exam. But, I have learned not to always expect that! To be fair, my older son has been pretty good in the past about doing that, but the younger one is hopeless! (They have had mid and end of year exams since middle school).</p>
<p>I do agree that kids should know how to prepare/review/study for end of term (or end of year) exams in order to be ready for college exams, so I am not in favor of full exemptions. But if my child is taking 7 subjects and can be exempt from a couple of them (of course I would have a great deal to say about WHICH subjects were chosen), then I'm not going to argue too much.</p>
<p>I will not, however, send my child to school when sick just to keep his attendance record up. If he doesn't meet the requirements - so be it.</p>
<p>I have never heard of such a lax requirement--a C average? And the no absences rule doesn't make sense for a couple of reasons: spreading germs, and excused absences for field trips.</p>
<p>At our HS you are exempt from FINAL exams if you have an A average in the course (including the midterm.) Otherwise, you are not considered to have learned the material.</p>
<p>As the OP I can tell you that my son did not find much in terms of actual research on this topic…he has realized since doing the speech that exemption does not help a student, but only makes life easier in the short run - not having to study so much during finals - but hurts in the long run - once you have to study large sums of material for quarter/semester finals at college that can count for up to 50% of your total grade in college!</p>
<p>His principal told me recently that he tried to get the policy changed this year (to rid or modify exam exemption) and was met with so much adversity from school administration that he got nowhere.</p>
<p>No exam exemptions here in NY. At least I’ve never heard of any. NYS publics are very exam-focused, and all students are expected to pass a minimum number of Regents exams, which are given statewide. The culture just doesn’t seem to exist in this state for exam exemptions so I would be very interested in hearing of any exceptions to the rule.</p>
<p>Exam exemptions are my kids high school only for seniors, only at the end of the year (everyone takes the mid-terms) with a B or better who have zero unexcused absenses. I think it’s just fine for the seniors, the zero unexcused absenses keeps the kids coming to school (if they are sick and a parent calls in or the kid brings a doc note, it’s excused).</p>
<p>No exemptions here in SoCal. Like others had said, once my DD finished with her AP exams she does not have a final in those classes. DD had a Spanish teacher in hs that let them skip both the mid-term and final if the had 93% or above in the class. DD did not like language classes, but kept her grade above 93% to not have to take the exams.</p>
<p>Well, at my DD’s school only seniors are granted any exam exemptions. They have to have a 91 average or above and there may be some attendance criteria (I know they don’t need perfect attendance though.) I think it’s a great carrot to keep senior grades up, even after they’ve found out that they’ve been accepted to a college. </p>
<p>The younger grades always complain that they’re not included, but that one of the perks of being a Senior.</p>
<p>No exam exemptions at my son’s school. The school runs on a block schedule so marking goes like this - 1/3 of the final grade comes from 1st marking period, 1/3 of the final grade comes from the 2nd marking period and 1/6 from the midterm exam and 1/6 frm the final exam to make up the final grade for the class.</p>