Parents of the HS Class of 2018 (Part 1)

Our school allows after school “off campus PE” to count for the PE credit. It has to be approved and is based on the number of hours and for what ever reason can not be done during the summer break. D16 did an out door education PE class that included hiking, mountain biking, rock climbing, kayaking, paddle boarding, swimming, surfing, and camping. S18 is doing fencing for his PE credit.

At our school PE/Health is required all 4 years of HS…even if you are a 3 season athlete. Our HS PE requirements exceed the state requirements for PE.

@2014novamom & @3scoutsmom, our school requires 2 years PE classes in order to graduate, they don’t accept “off campus PE”, but if student is athlete, that counted as PE - athletes, because All althelets PE classes are on 6th period ONLY and students not allowed to take 7th period class, due to practice and tournaments normally take loooong time after school (and some sports practice off campus like swimming, water polo, golf, etc.). Many students want to try PE -Athletes so they can be waived for weekly mile run requirement, as well PE homework and quiz (yes, PE class gives out homework and tests); some students needed to take regular PE for the flexibility to choose classes on 6th & 7th period.

I guess it’s kind of good to consider sports as PE class to meet the requirement, but like what @2014novamom said, now my DD’18 don’t have free period to take other electives… English, math, history, science and foreign language plus sport… Unless we learn to get up really early for zero period at 6:30. We will consider that in 11th grade if she decides to take another class or wants to keep doing the same sport. However, comparing with @MAsecondtimer HS, at least we have option to stop after 2 year. Should feel Thankful!

D’18 received her first mailing from a college this week…and it begins. We never saved all of the mailings for S’14 but if we had the pile would have been enoumous! I can’t even figure out where they got her name as she hasn’t done any standardized testing yet?

My DD’18 has been receiving college mails since 8th grade every couple months. Schools from midwest and north west that we never visited or heard of. She doesn’t even read them or look at them, I just brief to her and throw them away. I sometimes wonder how they target prospect students, I felt bad when throw those letters or brochures away. Colleges are investing on those stamps and not getting responses from us. I wonder how those school got her name also, but I worried it’s my scholarship search profile or college confidential or related app leak out personal info.

First day of school for our DD’18! XC tryouts tomorrow. Hello sophomores.

I think the colleges have a variety of ways to find the kids, but most would be through state required tests (like we have in this state), PSAT, SAT if they did it through a program like Duke TIP, etc.

Hope first day of school goes well glido. School doesn’t start until next Tuesday here (but band has already started - hello drum line).

Woot! Got S18’s schedule yesterday and they had him in a CAD class instead of the engineering class that he requested. I thought it was going to be a huge deal to fix with a new GC and the engineering class being very very popular and it’s usually for 11th and 12th grade students. My son had to get a special person to take the class and get it signed off by his GC and math teacher last year.

Sent the new GC a quick email explaining the situation and she fixed it first thing this morning no fuss at all. I’m really liking this new GC!

Here’s his new schedule:

AP PHYSICS 1&2
ENG 2 PREAP
AP W HIST
SCIENCE & TECH OF ENGINEERING
PRECAL PREAP
COMPUTER SCIENCE 2 ADVANCE
CHINESE 2
    (off campus PE - Fencing)

Our school starts on Monday.

Glad the schedule change was easy. No English requirement?

S’18 got everything he wanted, so that’s good news because we were out of town for the add/drop day at his HS. Schedules can change again on first day of school (not classes, but teacher and time) and can change again about three weeks after school starts to balance class sizes. It’s all part of a class size amendment that passed a few years ago.

@dadotwoboys He’s in English 2 PREAP second period. I’m actually hoping they change his Physics teacher to the the one his sister had last year, she was an amazing teacher.

AP Physics 1 and 2 without Calc? That is the algebra version?

My son’s public school is much more strict about changing schedules - you don’t after May of the year before.

Yes AP Physics is algebra based. They just released schedules yesterday and school starts Monday.

Oops - I missed the English. Looks like a challenging schedule

So, I am getting ready to take D#1 to college, and saw there’s a forum for sophomores. I figured I’d start this one early. Is anyone going to a specialty HS? My sophomore is majoring in vocal music at her HS. She intends on being a vocal performance major in college, as it stands now. So, it’s all about the music, right now. Not wanting to stress her out. Her schedule is

Honors English
Honors History
Spanish 3H
Geometry H
CP Chem
Vocal Music II
Music Theory II
Choir

Next year, she can take an IB certificate program, in addition to her music major, but I have to learn more about that.

I wonder what the IB certificate program is. DD is pursuing an IB diploma and it is a very rigid curriculum, particularly given the additional graduation requirements imposed by our school system. One of the required classes, theory of knowledge, is actually given after school junior year in order to accommodate all the requirements.

My DS 2014 went to a specialty high school and loved it. DD is going to a nearby public school although not the one for which we are districted since she is going for the IB diploma and our neighborhood high school is an AP school.

@3scoutsmom, I was struggling on whether to add Physics to my DD’18 class schedule, her high school required her to take regular science courses first before sign up for AP courses. Since she will take Chemistry honor class this year, if we add regular Physics then next year she can choose among AP Bio, AP Chem, and AP Physics. But I worried that it will be too much for her to handle if we add another science class which will be zero period. She likes to sleep, and zero period starts at 6:30am. I’m always impressed to see CC kids taking advanced courses.

@jjkmom the only reason he’s talking AP Physics 1/2 this year is because it’s required for the Engineering class which he was amendment about. Physics and World History will be his only very challenging classes.

There’s no way my kids could make it a 6:30 class! It’s a 45 minute to an hour drive to school depending on traffic. Here school starts at 8:40 they generally leave the house before 7:00 so they have time to do stuff and socialize before school. Definitely go for the sleep!

@3scoutsmom It’s good to know that you would chose “sleep” as well. My DD '18 and all althelets are required to have 6th PE/athlete class and can’t take 7th period classes. So if she wants to take additional courses, her only choice would be first period which starts 6:40. We are very lucky that we live in a small city and very close by her HS, only take less than 10min with morning school traffic. DD knows that she should take another difficult class but she wants to push to junior or senior year or even summer…

Our school district just pushed back high school start times to 8:10, citing numerous studies that show teenage sleep patterns are shifted and the detrimental effects of sleep deprivation. The district flipped elementary school and high school start times so now the little kids start earlier. Middle school stayed the same, and is between the two. A neighboring school district has had late start times for their high schools for years.

I would definitely be in favor of later HS start time. 7:33 am here and no talk of changing.

School starts on Tuesday, so enjoying a pretty laid back weekend after a very hot, very humid HS football game Friday night. The team won, the band sounded good and everybody sweat like crazy.