@VickiSoCal Perhaps the school can tell you what the pass rate is for the mandatory Chem sequence. If a high percentage passes it will settle your worries a bit.
UK schools donāt talk to parents. Like really, really donāt talk to them. 
Maybe if your kid is dead they might call you.
RE: Rude awakening with tougher classes: I hope my D has already had her wake-up call. Last year she took a full-time load at the community college in addition to her high school classes. She took Organic Chemistry, because she wanted āa challengeā. It kicked her butt, but she got through it. Quite a learning/growth experience, but I hope she doesnāt have a similar experience this year.
@CA1543 Iām sure your son will be fine. Maybe suggest he be proactive with his first writing assignment and take his draft to the writing center for feedback BEFORE he turns in the assignment.
D got the rude awakening as a junior. At her school, AP classes/tests (except calc BC) are a huge brain dump with students doing massively memorizing the info the day before.
That doesnāt work in IB. She failed her first IB HL bio test massively when she prepped that way. She had to learn a whole new way of studying for tests and it seems to me like it was very similar to what I needed in college. It was learning and synthesis of information like she had never needed before in AP classes.
Time will tell if this was helpful. She is taking 17 hours at Pitt her first semester.
D got her roommate info yesterday and Iām not sure how to feel about it. Turns out her other 2 roommates are close friends from the same high school in Washington. I thought that part of the matching process for housing was supposed to encourage meeting new people and separate people from the same high school, but I guess not. D will have three other classmates from her HS, but all are in different dorms. D seems fine with it, but I am just worried that she will get left out or teamed up against. Anyone else had to deal with roommate drama?
I know a few friends of D17ās who requested each other as roommates and were placed in triples.
@TimEnchanter was the placement of the friends in the same room a coincidence? My friendās daughter is going to be a Chapman frosh and I thought she said you couldnāt request roommates. In any case, having roommates that are already good friends could cause complications but your D sounds pretty easy-going. There are so many āwhat ifāsā going into the roommate situation!! Big picture view is that sheāll be meeting a ton of other people through the dorm, classes & clubs.
@jmek15 I am pretty sure you couldnāt request roommates, as I remember having the discussion with D about her HS classmates. Chapman does housing by college/major, so D wouldnāt have been able to room with one of her classmates even if she wanted to. D is with friends in California for the rest of the week, so I donāt know if she has reached out already to her future roommates or not. When she is away from home, communication is on an extremely limited basis, so Iāll find out more when she gets home on Friday.
@TimEnchanter Thatās disappointing to hear but itās good she has a good attitude about it! Hopefully, she can chat with them in advance to get a good sense if they will be inclusive.
I have to laugh at my kids sometimes. My D is in a suite with 6 girls and is rooming with a friend from high school. Within minutes of getting the room assignment the girls were texting each other, coordinating what to bring.
My son got his roommate assignment yesterday. He showed my his roommates Facebook photo. Last night I asked he had got in contact with his roommate and he says āMom Iām not looking for a best friend we are just rooming togetherā lol
Both of my kids are about as far away as you can be and still be on campus. No air-conditioning for my son. He still needs to buy a laptop. He is waiting for a new version of one but it has been delayed. I guess he is going to school with sheets, towels and his clothes.
One concern I have for S17 is that his first math class in college will be the 5th one in a 6 course sequence. So he will be mainly in with 2nd year students who are adjusted to the pace of the quarter system and the rigors of the school. I have no doubt heās capable of doing the work at a high level, just whether heāll be able to hit the ground running fast enough. The good of taking the dual enrollment classes in HS is being so far ahead, the bad is the same thing. Heās looked at a PDF of the text book a bit, so hopefully heāll have a little head start on the material.
I forgot to mention that D17 got another (small) scholarship from NYU this week prior to me having to pay the bill. Every little bit helps! This made me very happy
One thing to prepare yourself for (which I found to be a significant change with my son 2 years ago when he went to college). For 18 years, my wife and I pretty much knew where he was, who he was with, what he was doing and when he would be home. That was more true when he was younger but was still true even when he was in high school and through the summer before he left for college. He would ask if he could go certain places. Text/call when he got there and when he was leaving for home.
But that all changed totally when he went to college. Saying it changed overnight understates it because it changed as we were walking back to the car after leaving him in his dorm. Now we had now idea any of those things. It was very much a change that I had not thought about before coming home from work the next day and realizing that I didnāt know any of that info.
And it all worked out very well. He adjusted well to college, is doing well academically/socially, has a good job this summer, etc. So its all good. Just an adjustment that I had never really thought about coming so quickly.
@saillakeerie ā very thoughtful post and oh so true!
Wrong forum, Sorryā¦
I think this time last year we were putting up a hundred posts a day, or more.
Hoping that everyone is enjoying these last few precious lazy days together before the next chapter begins. :-S
Been a great summer so far. Just going by a little too fast.
@STEM2017 last 2 weeks at home for son17 before he leaves. We are going to be doing some fun stuff the next 2 weeks, so I am looking forward to it.
DS17 just came back for 5 days of Black Hat & Def Con - cyber security conferences in Las Vegas - in his element and got to connect with many techies, companies in the field (including his science research mentor) and IoT & computer equipment manufacturers. We are off on a vacation soon and he has to be on campus Aug. 19th for preorientation training to be an IT helper so enjoying last bit of time together - going fast. He got the courses he wanted and the dorm mountain is growing but in pretty good shape.