Parents of the HS Class of 2017 (Part 1)

Parents Forum Class of 20xx Community
25241

I am so excited about the board game topic! And I totally did not know about that Steam Tabletop business. Going to check it out today.

We love many of the games mentioned here, although Dominion lost its appeal once D20 figured out a pretty much surefire way to win every time by simply ignoring all the fun cards and just buying gold. It’s maddening. Maybe one of the expansions can overcome this, but it made the game a lot less fun.

What to add? We just got Alhambra (the big box with all the expansions was one of the 12 Days of Christmas deals on Amazon), a fun new game called Monarch that I think will have good replay value and one called the Rose King that we haven’t played yet.

We have a lot of two-player games: Jaipur, Settlers of Catan card game (and all the many expansions), Battlelines, etc. We also love Castles of Burgandy, which can play four but two people also work well. Others for more players? Puerto Rico is super complex but fun. Lords of Waterdeep, fun but can take forever. Carcassonne Stone Age, Seven Wonders, etc.

I just lost a heated game of Seven Wonders with friends last night-- curses! I was toppled by the friend at the table who passed over all military cards in favor of science. That’s a strategy I often try, but it doesn’t always work.

Those looking to suck hapless friends into board gaming can’t go wrong with Ticket to Ride. We call it the gateway game, and it’s never failed us. Then graduate to Seven Wonders, which although it can take a while to explain, is relatively easy to grasp after the first playing, can host up to seven players and there are so many ways to win or lose, and so many variables based on what your neighbors are doing that it doesn’t get boring. Finally, I love Citadels, which we can’t play anymore because we’ve worn out the character cards and now we can’t sub in any of the new characters b/c it’s totally obvious just from looking at the backs of the cards. I think it’s time to buy a new set, and some card sleeves to keep them safe.

And, now that I’ve revealed our true geeky nature, we can go back to talking about how much we hate IDOC. How many different ways can there possibly be to document that a student didn’t pay taxes, didn’t file a W2, didn’t file a 1099, didn’t fill out a 1015, etc? I’ve submitted three different things just this morning. Gah!

25242

QOTD: Transcript doesn’t include classes taken before high school in credits or GPA calculations.

25243

HS classes before HS only count for GPA if taken AT the high school. For example we could take Geometry at the HS or at the MS. If you take at the MS then you get credit, but no grade. If you take summer school at HS before your freshman year, you get credit and it will count towards GPA.

I’ve never heard of the H/AP grade bump called a ‘quality point’ :))

25244

High-school level classes taken in middle school in our district are on transcript and included in GPA. These are classes that terminate with a NYS regents exam that’s designed for HS students, so it makes sense that they are counted all around. Our district accelerates middle school honors classes in math, science, and language (no regents exam for language in the first year, but it’s a three year sequence that ends with a regents).

Also, all of the talk about weighting and 4.0s is so odd to us. All grades here are out of 100 and there’s no weighted GPA at all. All classes count equally for final GPA for class rank, including PE (other than factoring in whether a class is only half-year or every other day, so it counts half as much).

25245

Wow – We have 5" + of snow here – NY coastal area – hope kids can get home from robotics event today - about 1.5 hrs - north! School building got closed.

25246

Wow – We have 5" + of snow here – NY coastal area – hope kids can get home from robotics event today - about 1.5 hrs - north! School building got closed.

25247

Wow – We have 5" + of snow here – NY coastal area – hope kids can get home from robotics event today - about 1.5 hrs - north! School building got closed.

25248

QOTD: HS level courses taken pre-HS do not appear on the HS transcript.

Online courses taken at one of the approved online programs will appear on the HS transcript. School handles the registration and school requires, in addition to updates on grades, a written assessment of how the student is performing in the course every 6 weeks.

School does not calculate GPA.

25249

Coastal CT and looks to be the same amount of snow (from inside my house at least). ECs were cancelled (Quiz Bowl, Track meet, etc)

Could really use a snow day during the week in order to catch up before midterms. Not loving this at all…and it is cold!

Safe travels to your robotics team members @CA1543

25250

QOTD: Our HS counts all classes taken for HS credit in GPA - D17 had Spanish 1, Algebra, Earth Science, and Studio Art 1 in 8th grade and those carried over and are included on transcript (as are NYS Regents grades for Algebra and Earth Science.)

25251

@stencils The 4.0 grade point system is used in most colleges. You’ll get used to it. :slight_smile:

25252

I’m also a bad parent. DH and I play Cards Against Humanity with our kids. Well, we did – D1 won’t play with us anymore because she says it’s too embarrassing, but her friends still like to when they come over.

I haven’t yet played Exploding Kittens, but I did join the Kickstarter campaign for their new game. I think it’s called Bears vs. Babies?

QOTD: Classes typically offered in MS, like Algebra I, don’t get counted for HS credit. However, we had a first-ever situation for the (small, rural) district, where D1 and another student went to the HS every day during 8th grade to take Geometry. They received no HS credit for that, either, and D1 did end up having to take extra HS math.

Last year I went exploring on the state’s education website and found out that the school’s refusal to count the class was against state regulations. Doesn’t matter now, though, as D1 is in college.

25253

Senioritis- Manifested as a drop off in EC participation. Although she did refuse to redo an assignment that would have pulled an A- up to an A. I wasn’t happy about it, since it was an easy fix.

No middle school courses on transcript.

25254

QOTD: Middle School Work on Transcripts

This policy has changed from S’14 and D’17 to S’20. For foreign language for D’17 she got credit, but no grade on her transcript. Two years of middle school Spanish equated to one year of high school credit. No credit or mention on the transcript for Algebra 1 or Algebra 2 in middle school.

For S’20, no foreign language credit on the transcript.

A select few eighth graders in the discrict are bussed to the high school to take Honors Geometry. I do not know how that is handled since it never happened for us.

25255

S like games, both board, card, and online. He has pandemic, ticket o ride, and a number of others that we mentioned. I’ll have to check out illuminati. He may like that. He is also a big bridge player. It is funny to see some of the adult tournaments with all of these “grandparents” and a few high school kids.

And the downside of going to school across country, D15 barely made it back to her school-local airport due to the weather snafus all across the county. She did make it, but her suitcase has not yet arrived. It could have been worse. And our school district has already postponed the first day back Monday due to projected bad weather conditions. One more day of winter break for many.

@Mom2aphysicsgeek, HS classes taken before HS are on the transcript and count toward the GPA. Too bad S got a B+ in Spanish I in 8th grade. But his algebra and geometry grades made up for it. :wink:

25256

QOTD: No junior high classes (that’s what we call 7th and 8th) go on the HS transcript or count in GPA. The UC system just asks for the names of math and foreign languages that count, but not the grades. He had 2 math and 1 Spanish courses for that list.

So, Alg I and Geometry didn’t count for his math credits needed to graduate. Since he skipped precalc, we had to be careful that math he took post Calc BC could be counted for dual-enrollment credits, or he might not have been able to graduate for not enough math credits, even thought the school offers nothing after Calc BC.

Classes do count and are weighted if taken at the community college prior to HS. That would require significant paperwork in 8th grade, but is common for the summer after 8th grade.

25257

QOTD: No middle school classes on transcripts sent at our NJ public school - only 9-12. Interesting, I was not aware that any schools counted HS classes taken in middle school. I would think it’s obvious you took some if you have higher level math/science/language freshman year. But I guess it’s unfortunate they are not factored into the GPA.

Online summer courses during HS also do not factor into gpa, but do show up on transcript with the grade.

As @ynotgo mentions, the only college asking us for middle school info was the UC’s.

25258

QOTD: I think S’s middle school math class appears on his transcript with a grade but without being factored into the GPA. I can’t swear to it though as the copy I had seems to have disappeared. He’s picking another up Monday for another purpose so I’ll look at it then.

25259

QOTD: I think the state of Florida requires “College” prep classes, taken in Middle school be included in your HS transcripts. My son has Algebra 1 Honors (7th grade) and Geometry Honors (8th grade) included on his HS transcripts. No other classes.

Florida’s Public Universities also require these classes be included in the transcripts and, if used, entered in the student self-reported academic record (SSAR).

25260

@ilikesporks Thanks, I did had a 4.0 system in college; strictly ABCD with no +/-. A=4, B=3 etc. Generally the no +/- really helped my college GPA. I would have had quite a few A minuses that thankfully were still 4.0s :slight_smile:

I wasn’t clear, my confusion is how to convert the 100 scale to the 4.0 scale, especially when the inconsistency of weighting is thrown in. Kids here on CC throw around weighted grades like they are gospel, and consistent from school to school, and obviously they aren’t.

The valedictorian in DDs HS typically is somewhere between 99.0 and 99.5, unweighted, and as you’d expect that (usually) consists of a mix of honors, AP, NYS regents-level classes, and local elective classes. My assumption was that a 99+ GPA is all A+s in a 4.0 system, which would mean a 4.0 unweighted GPA. I was curious, so I did some hunting and found a conversion table on the school’s guidance dept. website that states a 97-99 is a 4.3, 93-96 is a 4.0, 90-92 is a 3.7 and so on. Even that seems off, since a 4.3 sounds like they are creating a weighted grade from a non-weighted 0 to 100 GPA…