here in our state, you have to be 18 to take the EMT test, and D24 won’t be 18 until about 3-4 week after high school graduation. So it’s a no go this summer.
Congrats on your kiddo’s road test!
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Has she thought about getting her CNA certification?
From the Arizona Board of Nursing
https://www.azbn.gov/licenses-and-certifications/nursing-assistant-types
I checked a couple of other sites (including this one) and don’t see a requirement to be 18 to sit for the test.
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My gut says that you have to be 18, but we will look into it for sure!
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Struggling with teacher shortage in NC especially at my son’s small Montessori public school. Math and Chemistry online have been especially hard. Self paced really hard to keep him motivated. He doesn’t have any interest in majoring in science or math. Next year should be better as there are teachers for the classes he hopes to take. Trying to catch up to pull his grades up a little.
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@momnc that sounds really tough! We had hybrid school all through freshman year, and S24 admitted that he was only learning on in-person days. Some students need everything that comes with being present to stay engaged.
After he got two D’s first quarter, I started homeschooling him in bio and Spanish. It was lucky that I used to be a Spanish teacher and I like bio, but it was a huge time commitment. It only worked due to S24’s personality, and he still got a C for the year in bio.
My heart goes out to everyone affected by teaching shortages!
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Also struggling in NC with the teacher shortage. My D26 is in her first year of high school. By December, her math teacher and english teacher both disappeared. The classes were “taught” by a revolving door of substitutes. Not taught at all, and barely overseen at all. D26 was miserable, and asked if I would pull her out.
I already had a home school registered with the state for D24 who has been h’schooled for the past few years. I finally pulled D26 out of public school. She’s learning a lot more, is 1000% happier, and to be selfish, my days are easier to manage not having to drive across town twice a day for drop-off and pick-up.
The teacher shortage is a real thing!
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We’ve run into that this year in Calculus. Between mid-Nov and end of Dec, there was no teacher so the kids basically taught themselves using lesson plans the previous teacher had already put together. But they all did horribly since there was no knowledgeable teacher to ask questions of.
They hired on a new teacher who began at start of Jan and things are going much better but I have no idea at the moment what D24’s grade actually is.
I feel your pain!
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Thanks for the replies. Really validates the pain we have felt this year. Next year he will probably choose courses based on whether there is a teacher for his senior year. Luckily he has some choice.
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So S24 shown us his Second quarter report card on Friday.
All As and A+s. GPA was up and got to 3.85 (from 3.4).
However, lately he has been too busy doing school work, worry about ACT and SAT (registered for both in March and April), ECs, EMS, improving his track time and swim time… etc. He finally had a mental break down just 50 mins ago (after a small argument with his mother).
He cried and cried for 20 mins that he did badly and there is not enough time to do everything right, too mcuh school works to follow up, too much after school works to keep up (few of the clubs he is in the top people (senios) left and he was leading them for the last month), and that he been holding it all under the rock for months now. He’s scary he will do bad on ACT and SAT… etc.
After he has calmed down a little, we had a long chat about delegating his club duties to others, take time out from trak and swim, stop EMS rides out for a month, drop ACt and just take the coming SAT as a test, to see how you do, instead of over thinking it. Break down which class works are more imporatn and he needs the mos time to spend on, divide and conquer.
It was the first time he displayed such strong emtion, the wife was taken aback and blamed herself for not helping enough. I had to explained to her that she has, she bascially helped him organized and prepared everything for him.
After the long chat we had, S24 is doing better. He still feels like there is a rock dragging, but now that we have discussed how to not face everything at once, he is trying to delegate club tasks, and prioritize school works, so it won’t be so overwhelming.
We are easy going and never wanted him to work too hard. He wanted to be a doctor, we just wanted him to take up something easy as doctor is hard work and long hours (even a trade job like plumbing would do), since his health is not the best. But I think seeing how all of his peers are doing well, the pressure to excel is slowly clouding him and pushing him to do more. When he was elected to lead several clubs, or as chair in MUN, the pressure got too real.
And also, all the crying had triggered his asthma… sigh* 
Oh, man, poor kid! We’ve had moments like that in our household, too. Sounds like your kiddo ran out of spoons (if he doesn’t know about spoon theory yet, this would be a good opportunity to teach him about it). It’s totally normal in times like this to prioritize. And to let less important stuff go a little bit. You can’t be 100% all of the time.
I think it’s also important for teenagers to realize that while all of their peers may seem like they have their act together, they don’t. They may put on a good face, but they, too, struggle.
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This 100%. And often times it is the ones who appear to be the most “together” that are secretly falling apart.
A tad more progress this week towards college admissions. D24 looked up undergrad major requirements for 2 majors at NMSU. We are going to visit there for an open house on 2/20. Their biochem major requires 2 semesters of Calculus, so D24 said that major is a big no. But she likes their BS in microbiology or biology much better.
Saturday a.m. she spent at school doing a mock AP USH exam. Spent a lot of Sunday watching Modern States lectures online for their “History of the United States I” class. She has 5 lectures left to go, then can take the practice test. Then when you pass the practice exam, you can take the actual CLEP exam.
Hope everybody has a good week!
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I’ve run into that when mentoring HS pre-engineering students who are doing well, yet focus (and stress) on how others around them are even further ahead in math or whatever. My pitch: “I’ve seen how it works beyond college, and it turns out there are many many paths to achieving your career goals. You are on your path to success, and they are on theirs. The paths don’t all have to look exactly the same.”
In particular, having worked shoulder-to-shoulder in a large engineering organization with graduates of various (USA) undergrad programs, it didn’t seem to matter much where they had studied when it came to their “outcomes”. Rather, how much effort they put into their studies while there, and then how hard (and smart) they worked once in the job. Your son’s hard work is positioning him to do well in undergrad studies, as well in whatever comes next. That’s true regardless of what’s going on with a relative handful of other students he happens to have contact with.
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One of the college related podcasts I listen to often says stuff like “It’s not where you go, it’s what you do once you get there.”
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Been looking at NMSU stuff since we are headed there next weekend for an open house. Some of the bio and biochemistry professors are doing some cool research there. And the fact that the yearly price tag (tuition, fees, room, board) is ~$7300/yr less than UofA is a pretty big plus, too. Hoping that D24 gives it a thumbs up. We will see!
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Even DH perked up when I told him the price difference. He said, “Oh…REALLY? Huh! COOL!”
…this…from the guy who still occasionally talks about wanting a “return on investment” of paying for college. 
Honey, the return on investment will be the kid not living in the proverbial basement until she’s 30. 
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Some updates here…D24’s final grades for first semester are in and she had the best semester of her entire high school career, in spite of having the most challenging grouping of classes all at once (Physics, Pre-Calc, AP Chem and US History 2). Back in August, she was freaking out about how she was going to handle it all and was talking about dropping the Chem class. We soft-forced her to at least start it and see how it went. Turns out, it has been her favorite class. I’m so proud of her. She got her mid-year gpa and class rank and both improved significantly.
We meet with her counselor in a few weeks to discuss course choices for next year. In addition to the core requirements (English, History, Gym) D24 is interested in taking AP Bio, Anatomy and Physiology, Calculus and Television Production (
). The only thing debatable is that she is recommended for AP calc and she would prefer to take a lower level of the class. I’m going to back off on any recommendation on this, but I’m secretly kind of hoping her guidance counselor talks her into it. She’s starting to express an interest in possible majors…biomedical engineering, biochemistry, food science… so obviously, I think having the most rigorous math class available to her on her transcript is important.
Finally, we are touring UDel next week and Stevens Institute of Technology the week after. Will see Rutgers in a few weeks. Planning an April tour through upstate New York to see Marist, Syracuse and RIT. All of this is later than we were doing the same with my D20, but…different kid, different readiness timeline. I’m just happy we’ve got some forward momentum.
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D23 is taking Anatomy & Physiology this year and absolutely loves it. I was a bit worried because she can be squeamish but she’s been a rock star in dissection especially! She wants to be a PT so this was one of the first, “Is this really the right direction” kind of classes. And yes, it does seem to be right up her alley.
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That’s awesome!
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My laugh of the day (figured many here would appreciate this…). D24 told me this morning she had a dream last night that she figured out a way to launch herself to the moon. It was so beautiful up there, quiet and peaceful and she was just in awe of herself for getting there. Then, she turned around and suddenly I was there too, with a reminder to “please study for the SAT.”
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