<p>I can hardly believe it, and he may only be pulling my leg (with a perfectly straight face) but now that he's gotten into a good school, my son insists he's not going to be doing any homework for the rest of the year.</p>
<p>He unfazed by any stories of revoked admissions and I'm sure he wouldn't let himself (at least knowingly) slip that far. And he doesn't want to hear about keeping his mind in shape, or improving his writing and org abilities; even the prospect of AP credits being used to get out of intro classes (or repeating them and getting A's first year) doesn't seem to carry any weight.</p>
<p>Okay, he announced this just yesterday, the first day of returning to HS after winter break, and it may be bravado, or relief vs friends who have months to hear, or a temporary thing. Heck, he may even get bored with the freedom or remember that he always liked school.</p>
<p>Hopefully he just wants to get a rise out of his old man, but, has anyone else experienced this? Any recommendations in case it persists?</p>
<p>If your son would like to have some more free time and less pressure, he could consider dropping or decreasing his involvement in some extracurriculars -- especially if he has any extracurricular activities that he was only doing to enhance his college admissions prospects. Unless it's something dramatic (like resigning as student body president), the college he has been accepted to will neither know nor care.</p>
<p>But he does need to keep his grades up. Although his ED school probably would not mind if a few of his As slipped to Bs, the problem is that when a student starts goofing off, those Bs can easily become Cs and Ds, and the college would definitely care about that. In many high school courses, homework counts for a significant portion of the grade. Getting zeroes on all those assignments, plus losing the preparation for tests that they would provide, could easily lead to a DRASTIC lowering of grades, which is very risky.</p>
<p>Also, he needs to be careful not to violate any laws or get suspended from school. Those things do get reported to the colleges and can lead to an admission being rescinded.</p>
<p>You might want to remind him that his school will want copies of mid-year and final grades. In the acceptance letter, there should have been a mention of the possible rescinding of the acceptance should those grades fall off. Colleges do look at final grades (regardless of whether it's ED or RD) as a barometer of how the student will do in a much more unstructured setting. Bottom line: how badly does he want to attend that school?</p>
<p>(For me - S [RD] worked hardest his last semester b/c he didn't want to risk it; D [ED1] continued to plug along but that was in her nature. But the guidance counselors did cite examples from previous graduating classes of students whose admissions had been rescinded. That helped the most.) Good luck!</p>
<p>A little chat with his teachers letting them know of his new attitude could help - they may have a better chance of knowing whether he's just yanking your chain! And the teachers may let up on homework for seniors anyway.</p>
<p>If, after he's back in the swing of things and you see that he's not yanking your chain: What would your plan be if he did get revoked? I know that mine would be, "OK. Now you go to work for at least a year, maybe more. I was going to pay happily for this opportunity for you (to the tune of however much I was going to pay), but you blew it. Next time, you get to pay at least half of what I was going to pay. Why should I care more about your opportunities than you do? You think you're an adult? OK. Be one."</p>
<p>Realizing that getting revoked ends the Mom & Dad gravy train may be enough.</p>
<p>Now I do have to say that a friend of ours did a bit of the same thing - did some homework, completed papers & projects, but not to the extent that she had been doing so before. Gave them about 1/2 effort. No problems, and she's doing very well at her ED college now.</p>
<p>My S worked hardest the semester after his SCEA admission, but that's because he was not taking courses for the sake of getting into a college (except for senior English, but he happened to like that teacher a lot). He took the AP tests, even knowing he would not use them for credit, had a long paper due one week after the AP tests instead of nearly a month later because he was graduating early, plus finals for his college courses. </p>
<p>One reason not to slack off: suppose he wanted to transfer for some reason, he would have to submit his whole high school transcript. Even if he did not have Ds, a string of Bs and Cs would not help his chances of transferring.</p>
<p>A little senioritis is not uncommon for many students however you should monitor your son's hw habits. If his hs is like most, failing to do any hw will reduce those A's to C's or worse, admissions will likely be rescinded and the 3+ years of hard work will come to naught. He needs to know that forcefully.</p>
<p>If his schedule includes more than 4 AP classes perhaps he may be able to drop a class which is an elective like psych or statistics.</p>
<p>As far as taking the AP tests are concerned, I would leave that up to him. However you need to know that retaking the same course in college in no guaranteed A. In fact in some colleges it is quite the opposite. In my day, oh so long ago, first year calculus/chem/physics courses were quite difficult and I came out of first semester with a sub 2.0 gpa and I thought that I worked reasonable hard.</p>
<p>He may be just yanking your chain. I'd recommend yanking his. How about typing out a list of all his teachers & their emails & letting him know you'll be informing them of his new no homework policy. Then you could calculate the total cost for tuition at his college of all his AP courses that would be accepted if his scores were high enough. Let him know that you'll be subtracting that amount from any support you've promised him. He'll get the message.</p>
<p>"In many high school courses, homework counts for a significant portion of the grade."</p>
<p>Now I'm beginning to understand why there are so many students on CC with inflated grades....In 4 years here at "grade deflation high", my d has never had a class (honors or AP) that counted hw at all....You are expected to do it; if you don't, your problem, your grade...Let me tell you, the kids who want to do well do all their hw....</p>