@sybbie719 and all,
We have not yet registered for the outside school course. All your inputs are hence very valuable. Thank you.
He had started Sophomore year with a few weighted courses in Fall before his concussion and then had to drop them all. Now he wants to be able to catch up and finish at least one of them (Chemistry), since it is a pre-requisite for others he wanted to do in high school. I know, we ought to focus on him getting back to health. But what does that mean, when it comes to a traumatic brain injury? There is no telling whether or not there will be full recovery, although neurologists say he will recover. He is a Gifted and Talented Student, but now faces brain fatigues and headaches if he studies/deep thinks/analyzes without a break. Everything needs to be paced and he needs to study at his pace, now and for rest of high school.Plus he cannot rest it out on hard subjects either, just because they trigger symptoms. He needs to study up and build brain stamina little by little at his pace. Full-time enrollment at a regular high school may hence not work for him in the next year at least and he will need to rely on private independent study ($$$) courses so that he can study the difficult subjects at his pace, in a least stimulating environment. At the same time, he needs to be in school environment for social and emotional well being. Hence we figured a hybrid approach is necessary. The school district revamped their policies for 2018-2019 school year onwards, since his concussion happened at school and I think they realized the need for studying higher level courses (not offered within public school district’s independent study school), at the student’s pace. So they are approving up to 40credits taken at a WASC accredited institution, on UC approved a-g courses, be they online or in-person private school (off-campus). This is great news and will help students like my son going forward. But for the current year, we are struggling to understand best way to proceed.
@thumper1, yes we got a 504 plan defined in late January this year after a lot of struggle and it has been a boon, without which he couldn’t make it through partial day (4 periods) at regular high school. His teachers are the same as before his concussion. They are super nice, understanding and accommodating, and value his high achievement prior to concussion. We did not have a health plan, though the district was trying to start one and did not give us information on what it was about, so I don’t know what it would have provided. Then they dropped it and didn’t go that route. We do not have a case manager, so our counselor is our only resource and most often that not, I have not got any answers from that route. That is probably because the school is learning from my son’s experience as they go! By mid December he started at the district’s independent study alternative high school and caught up on World History and PE for semester 1. He remains concurrently enrolled there alongside regular high school and working independently on English 10 semester 1. They are asking that he add another elective subject (World Geography) to make it a true concurrent enrollment. They did not accept taking the AP Human Geography credits done in summer school previously. On that same account I am thinking they will not accept Chemistry either and hence wanted to know if there was any use in trying to get it done outside school district.
He can always wait it out this year, take it slow, do it in the next two years at high school and try not to think of his setbacks due to not proving rigor etc. Ours is an extremely competitive high school, with the highest number of APs taken by students in the entire State and only 6th highest in the country. It is a College Board AP Honors school. Hence the peer pressure is tremendous and I’m not sure College admissions folks will realize why he couldn’t do a similar rigor. Plus he needs to do things that allow him to regain confidence. These are my considerations.