@curiositycat333, your post takes me back to D1’s last two years in high school. Both daughters were sensitive to being nagged but D2 was very self-motivated and would always get things done on time. D1 was another story. I tried very hard (not always successfully) to not nag but H did not. Interestingly, he and D1 both have ADD. I thought that might result in H feeling more empathy for D1 but it didn’t seem to. It was very painful to witness their interactions (including about calculus; H is very good at math but despite being a tutor then, stunk at helping D1 with her homework).
Do we all have the same husband???
Lol
Fathers and math help are almost never a good combo. Mr. Taco, an MIT grad, bristles at they money I pay for TacoDaughter’s tutor, but it’s less expensive than long-term therapy.
I live in what most people would consider an affluent area but they do have a free and reduced lunch program. I never asked, even in the year I paid for 6 tests, if there was any discount though I think that there is a fund to assist in payments for the free and reduced lunch families, especially since the test is mandatory. Interestingly, even though every student takes the test, the grade is not incorporated into the average for the class. I was a free lunch kid so it makes me proud to be able to at least pay for the AP tests without assistance.
@techmom Yes there is a discount for those who can’t afford it. You have to apply through CollegeBoard, and I think it is tied to the free lunch program.
But it’s more than just those kids. There are lots of kids in the middle. And the basic policy is the district (which is interpreting state law) can’t Require ANYONE to pay for class programs. Basically nothing that would affect a grade. There was a big suit in CA a few years back that affected this. Public schools were nickeling & diming the parents. Our school stopped requiring summer reading books. The school can’t require the PE uniform (they can require appropriate clothes) but can’t say they HAVE to be the school shorts/ t-shirt.
They can charge for field trips, but only if there is another option available for those that don’t with to go. Ie… it can’t be tied to their grade. (And I know the PTA has some funds to cover kids who want to but can’t afford it.)
Since our school doesn’t pay for the AP tests. I thought the official line was they couldn’t use for grading. Thus they can’t make the test mandatory, and I thought couldn’t use the test to affect their grade.
@tacocat333 My son would never be able to take tutoring from his father.
My husband was never able to teach him chess. Because my husband couldn’t ever manage to play badly enough, to give the kid a chance.
I did successfully tutor my D through her H.S. math. But she’s a different kid entirely. I got a lot of grief from the H.S. about my tutoring. They kept insisting that it would not work, and wasn’t appropriate by H.S. What they didn’t get was your average tutor had no idea how to help her.
My dad was an electrical engineer and I still cringe at the thought of him helping on my math homework. It’s not that he couldn’t teach it to me - he just did it differently and even though I could do the math “his way” the teacher would have failed me. It was a semester full of tears, then a parent-teacher conference, and finally the counselor let me drop (not sure to this day what happened in that conference and I don’t want to know). My dad is the typical loud Italian guy and I’m sure words were said.
Luckily DS’17 has his older engineering major brother to help him with the calc but I constantly get the “I’ve got this”. His brother is really good at checking up on him though and heads off problems as if it were a normal conversation. (I may need to study his technique)
AP tests here don’t affect grades at all and no one is required to take them. We have mostly decided to skip the AP Calc test - just seems to make the most sense and if he really “has this” it should be an easy A in college (haha).
I have the same H you all do!! Not much of a problem with S17, but with S19? Oh boy! And they are cut out of the same piece of cloth.
Our school requires students that take an AP class to take the AP test, but the test is not part of the grade. So a student can get a 5 on the exam, and still have a low grade in the class.
@Fishnlines29 --big congrats to your D on NYU. The 1st year in Paris sounds great!
For S17, looks like he qualifies for the WUE tuition reduction at Colorado State–Whew!
In Florida, the AP tests are free but if you take the class, you HAVE to take the exam. My daughter took AP Spanish her senior year and did not study for the exam for one SECOND. She didn’t care what the grade was because she knew it wouldn’t be a 4 or 5 to get college credit. Really, went to school on the morning of the exam, took a pencil, answered what she could and left. Did not care. I did not care because I didn’t have to pay $95 or whatever it cost.
My daughter wrote her name on the test booklet (for AP calculus) and probably doodled inside it. That was enough for her to get a “1” on the test and a C for the third or fourth quarter of her high school class, which kept her from failing. I wouldn’t advise this process for other students, but by spring of my daughter’s senior year in high school, the math ship had sailed long before and she was doing what she could to pass all her classes and still be able to go to college.
I don’t think there really are too many families in my SD that don’t qualify for free or reduced lunch and who couldn’t afford the test fees, but there may be some. When I said a fund, though, I didn’t mean college board fee waiver. Our SD has a discretionary fund in each school that pays for things like AP tests, prom tickets, senior year book, field trips that aren’t otherwise covered. I believe that a GC will recommend that something be covered for a particular student and then the committee reviews it and handles it. In the past few years, the school has sent around notices asking for donations to the fund rather than dinky gifts to individual teachers.
Thanks @Hankster1361 She’s excited!
D is not required to take the AP test for her AP classes, just midterms/finals. We decided not to pay for the AP exams. Most of her AP classes were in the sciences and she figures it will benefit her to take the classes again in college.
I’d originally thought our SD required the students to take the AP test but they do not. In WH, if you get a 4 or 5, they will up your final semester grade by a half or full grade ( I can’t recall which) but that is the only class I know of that does it. No fee waivers here unless you apply through the CB registration process. I think.
Hey all - laughed put loud at some of these posts - now in addition to Struggling Sons and Daughters in Calculus Club, we can all join the Have Husbands Who Have Magical Expectations Club (as if Dad’s wisdom pronouncements could turn our teenagers instantly into adults – isn’t that why we’re all looking for a good college fit for a process that will take at least 4 years, and even then with no guarantees!!).
We're still in the middle of our Beloit open house -- I will wait to post a comprehensive update tomorrow night -- but the most amazing thing is that CoyoteSon actually had a texting "conversation" with me, involving the actual exchange of information! This kid often has to be reminded to even take his phone -- and our previous (brutally brief) messages have only been about what time to arrange a ride. So yay, fingers crossed that this college experience will, in fact, help with the transformation from teenager to adult!
Certainly from my parent perspective, Beloit has a lot to offer, and the free reception with adult beverages for us parents once they sent kids to meet their host students - a very nice touch!
@CoyoteMom I look forward to hearing the update about Beloit. It kills me that it doesn’t seem a possibility for us since the aid they offered is so low compared to Kalamazoo. The weather is great there for February so it is a nice time to enjoy it. Glad to hear the steps toward adulthood. I feel like it will be this way with my S in 5 more years!
I was laughing too about the husband tutoring. My husband leaves most of the school stuff to me since I am the “geek” he says. The neverending lectures are his thing and it is hard not to cringe when it starts at the dinner table. He sees things as much more black and white and feels they should be more like he was. He does seem to forget some of his flaws though and I have to remind him often, “Remember when you were 16 and you would take the car out for joyrides without a license? In comparison, she is doing pretty well! Cut her some slack!”
@CoyoteMom I too can’t wait to hear about Beloit. It is one of the schools I like them a lot, just based on their mailings etc. wish it wasn’t quite so remote, still hoping son can get out there to see for himself.
My husband can’t do that “instruction” stuff with our son either. It just escalates quickly into something unpleasant and I don’t know why. Wish it wasn’t that way!
Son has to take the AP tests (and we have to pay for them) if he wants to get credit for the classes.
He is off to visit Trinity University (by himself!) tomorrow. I’m hoping it all goes well.
@CoyoteMom I’ll be interested to hear what you and CoyoteSon think of Beloit. My DS (a current freshman) has signed up to host visiting prospective students, though I’m not sure if he was hosting this weekend.
Well, Beloit College is now “my favorite college so far,” according to CoyoteSon! Ha ha–it was so nice of Beloit to “arrange” the 60-degree weather for their accepted students! One feature that really stands out is the world class Anthropology department, with a museum literally stuffed with thousands of artifacts that students can and do study (even many non-Anthropology classes use “the cube” for various assignments).
So, they did a great job organizing the open house; on Sunday we took what turned out to be a private tour, and listened to the Beloit college president give a welcome/inspirational speech, and then attended a terrific mix and mingle in the new and LEED-certified science center; a professor from every department and a student from almost every club was there for about an hour to chat with parents and prospective students. Then they split us up - we parents had two more events - a Q&A panel of recent alums (free beer/wine and classy appetizers provided) and then an informal prospie parent gathering with some AdComs at a cafe.
At the same time, our students joined their overnight hosts for dinner in the dining hall, plus a couple of evening social activities. CoyoteSon’s host turned out to be a freshman living in a single room who didn’t seem to be very social normally, but did take CoyoteSon to the dinner/video game club/student Improv show (“very funny”) - and then needed some quiet time in his dorm room (hence giving CoyoteSon time for the wonderfully detailed text conversation with me). CoyoteSon judges the rest of the student body to be sufficiently nerdy, and based on overhearing conversations plus a majority of t-shirt wearing kids, (really don’t think we saw any polo/vineyard vines types, though a sizable minority of purple/blue/green hair and body piercings. Also, decent mixing of people of different skin tones all hanging together – CoyoteSon reports there are a lot of Chinese exchange students who hang out in their own group, but otherwise pretty good mixing and matching- definitely the right crowd for CoyoteSon).
And finally on Monday - there was a full set of two concurrent info sessions for parents, (I attended study abroad, career center, first year seminar sessions), and CoyoteSon attended two classes - a History seminar (which wasn’t even on the list of available classes, but CoyoteSon got invited based on showing interest with the very charismatic professor the day before) and a Cognitive Science class (where students were testing the robots they had programmed against increasingly difficult mazes). CoyoteSon thought the professors were amazing, and enjoyed the student participation.
Both CoyoteSon and I had vouchers for lunches both days, and CoyoteSon had dinner - the meal plan food ranges from decent to really pretty good (both based on our meals and reputation from current students). In addition to main dining hall, there are a quick grab cafe and a coffe/snack shop on the meal plan/points system.
So - CoyoteSon could definitely picture himself on Beloit’s campus, and told me he liked it better than Haverford (which is a good thing, since I’m expecting that he’ll get rejected there anyway, with his scores just hovering at their 25-percentile for last year’s class). And secretly, I also think Beloit is probably one of his “best fit” options. So yay!
Also, no one would mistake “downtown” Beloit for amazing college town…but there are some/enough “hip” food joints for CoyoteSon all within 2-3 blocks of campus - a great burger place, a sushi/Asian restaurant, a cool cafe inside a wine store, a bagel place, and a coffee/bakery/ice cream shop. I did notice there was a Walgreen’s nearby – not sure about a grocery store.
And lastly - the career center helps students in very practical ways (including lending them a school car to get to an interview or internship for only the price of the gas); job shadowing opportunities, both locally and as trips to both the nearby cities plus selected other cities which include DC and Portland; and grants to help with summer internships…CoyoteSon got invited to apply for $2,000 grant for summer after freshman year – for really almost any kind of project/“research” trip he’d want to take. It’s not financial aid, but it is still a very nice additional perk - CoyoteSon got the email notification right before open house started, and attended a special session today from the Career Center to explain their process to help him develop his project proposal.
So - we were impressed with the friendly welcome from professors and students, the facilities, the support services for careers and tutoring and counseling, and the nerdy/liberal vibe. CoyoteSon is happy with this choice, and I think even the outstanding schools with better name recognition will have to “beat” Beloit for fit. We won’t likely visit any more schools until he gets the good news/bad news from the RD schools on March 31. April Fools Day, here we come!
@CoyoteMom Wow, sounds Beloit was a hit!
@CoyoteMom , I loved reading your review of the Beloit visit! It sounds like a perfect fit in all respects.