<p>There’s a lot of experience in the homeschooling community on taking CC and university courses while in high-school and asking about it on homeschooling email lists is a good way to go to learn about preparation, administrative obstacles and execution in a college environment. My usual suggestion on starting out is to take one course that should be easy for the student. That alleviates the academic pressure so that the student can get acclimated to the classroom environment, the professor, and interactions with other students.</p>
<p>Switching from high-school to community college can be a shock if the student does not know what to expect and doing so with a full course-load can be overwhelming if the level of work is much higher than what it was in high-school.</p>
<p>I once spoke to someone at the Registrar’s office at one of the schools our son went to and we discussed dual-enrollment. In the 1990s, the state legislature funded dual-enrollment courses for high-school students for a few years. The kids just had to have a way to get to state universities. She told me that it didn’t work out well for a lot of students as there was noone to make sure that kids went to classes and there were lots of distractions on college campuses that derailed these students (alcohol and drugs). High school kids used to classes where attendance is taken moving to an environment where you’re responsible for showing up can result in a disaster in terms of grades.</p>
<p>It’s pretty easy to answer critics of homeschooling but that’s not what this thread is about. We have bigger fish to fry in terms of state legislatures. If you want to debate the merits of homeschooling, there are far better places to do so.</p>
<p>I am a homeschooling mom of 4–my oldest son has been attending public hs and is now preparing to leave for college in the fall. He made the choice to go public because he wanted to be able to play football and baseball. He made a great transition and has been an amazing student (#4/580), but would tell me he didn’t want to come back to homeschooling because I was a harder teacher than his hs teachers! :)<br>
My second son is a hs freshman who choose to continue homeschooling at this point because it gives him the freedom to explore so many more activities. Is homechooling a high schooler difficult–yes! But he uses a computer program that many universities use for Spanish, and is taking an Honors English class online. Next year he will take Chemistry at the local private school. Most homeschoolers recognize our limits and seek out the best educational option we can for each particular child.
I also live in CA–it is better to write a letter to the hs to withdraw your daughter out–more professional and no face-to-face, just deliver by hand to the secretary and leave. I know many moms who have sat in on their children’s CC classes the first semester–either auditing them or enrolling in them also–treat your child as the “adult” they are striving to become, while still being there to help with the transition. I agree with a previous poster–don’t have her go back to her hs today, but do go to your CC today and start that process, as classes start soon here.<br>
Good luck, and I hope you and your daughter will become closer as you try to discern the best path for her to take at this point in her life.</p>
<p>I know you don’t trust the high school right now, but sometimes the school district has alternatives. I know our high school district offers a “middle college” route for kids like your daughter. It’s a program where high school kids are still enrolled at the high school, but take all their classes at the cc. The high school counselors help the students pick courses and deal with problems they come across there. And the kids can still participate in ecs at the high school (though most don’t as the reason they took that path is they were “sooo over” high school.) There are also alternate programs at other high schools in the district that emphasize less traditional paths, such as film or communications. </p>
<p>As others pointed out, there are also home school type alternatives in “private” schools. Here there is one called the School for Independent Learners. Kids take online classes, but go to the office to be tutored (if needed) and take tests. The other advantage to this type of thing is you can start anytime.</p>
<p>I don’t know what the situation is in CA - someone above posted that kids must stay in school until age 18? I am pretty sure that the age is 16 in NY.</p>
<p>I just checked our school district’s website, and there is a simple one-page form to withdraw a child from school.</p>
<p>Your local homeschooling organization will be the best source of information on this, and on how to proceed with your daughter’s education. I see nothing wrong with pulling her out now, rather than waiting until you have something else in place. She could probably use some time to recover from the recent bad experiences. </p>
<p>I think that HS must be the easiest time to homeschool!</p>
<p>Ilikebananas, when we took our son out of school in CA we just sent a letter saying we were withdrawing him in order to homeschool. We did not go into any explanations as to how or why. Short and sweet.</p>
<p>While I think you should examine whether homeschooling would actually solve the underlying issues your D is experiencing or not, you might want to check with your district regarding homeschooling. We briefly considered it not for social reasons but for challenge reasons - i.e. to provide more of a challenge than the public HS had but ultimately decided not to do it. However, when checking into it we found that the district has a homeschooling program. The district provides the books, curriculum, testing, oversight, etc., and they ultimately end up with a regular diploma for the district. I also notcied however, that the others there who were pursuing the homeschooling weren’t doing so for the reason we were considering it - they tended to be doing so for either social, i.e. some social issue with their kid, or religious reasons. There was one who was a professional kid actor who needed the flexibility of scheduling of homeschooling so that’s yet another reason. The religious ones were disappointed to learn that they couldn’t teach everything out of the bible since it was still the public school district running the homeschooling curriculum and there couldn’t be religious substitutions (although they could of course pursue it in addition to the normal curriculum).</p>
<p>There are also some Charter HS locations that are part of the public school district but again we found that many of the ones who chose the charter school did so for social issue reasons with their kids. This isn’t universal of course and there are different types of charter schools but it’s something else to consider.</p>
<p>Finally, you have to really determine if a full effort on the part of both the parents and the kid will be put into homeschooling should you decide to do it. I’ve known of some who were homeschooled who basically ended up doing the minimum they could get away with which sadly means they can get away with doing very little. </p>
<p>On the flip side of course are the national spelling bee, national geography, etc. winners who more often than not seem to be homeschooled but these are usually students who excelled throughout and have a serious homeschooling effort from prepared and organized parents. I think there are some scenarios like this on CC and they’d probably be homeschooling advocates but there’s a difference between this scenario and the ones who make the decision last minute and aren’t prepared to adequately support the homeschooling effort.</p>
<p>In retrospect I’m glad we didn’t homeschool. The public HS wasn’t perfect but I think the social interaction with a wide variety of fellow students was educational in itself. However, there are all kinds of experiences.</p>
<p>Ok this is the “real” ilikebananas posting, not my parents this time.
We’re just trying to gather some information about homeschooling, it’s not something we’re definitely planning on, but just something to consider.
My parents wish for me to finish off my Junior year of high school, but I dread returning back to school each day. I have recurring nightmares about specific incidents at school, and the school has a REALLY negative view of me. I’m sure that I won’t be able to get into any privates as a freshman applicant.
Like ucsd<em>ucla</em>dad said, yes I do have social issues at high school but that’s not the main reason I want out. I hate the toxic and competitive environment. People are so mean and ruthless. I was diagnosed with depression this year, and my parents asked the school to be accommodating and understanding. Nope. They basically blew us off and accused me of faking depression as an excuse for having difficulties in school.</p>
<p>So… I’d love to hear more of your perspectives on whether I should start homeschool. If you have any specific questions do ask!</p>
<p>If you were my child, I would withdraw you from school immediately. You would not go back on Monday. Then I would work with you to find a way to put together a program to complete your high school education and make the transition to college, and to also fill your needs for socialization, exercise, community service, etc. There are many ways to do this that would be far better than trying to stick it out in that HS. </p>
<p>I hope that you are seeing a therapist for the depression, and taking good care of yourself (exercise, diet, sleep), etc.</p>
<p>I have two friends in two different online high schools and they are complete crap, which is the only experience I have. Make sure you know what you’re signing up for if you go that route, I am SURE there must be some better than what my friends do but you don’t want to waste your time. Do your research and pick a good one, all online high schools are not equal.</p>
<p>There are some excellent online high schools and some terrible ones. The best bet for students/parents investigating online high schools is to get in touch with a homeschooling group or two to get the inside information.</p>
<p>I wish you would give a further breakdown of what went down in your high school. </p>
<p>With that being said. I would just like to take a moment to say that there are nice programs available for you to finish up your schooling. You could finish things up through BYU online and they do a proper evaluation of your course work and tell you what you need to take to finish things up. You could do the GED and just call things a blessed day and start in early on college courses through a community college. There are a lot of viable options for you but just make sure you do the totally legit ones.</p>
<p>Ucsd<em>ucla</em>dad says, if I understand him correctly, that when he was investigating homeschooling, he discovered that parents who chose the school district’s homeschooling program were homeschooling for reasons other than to provide their children more academic challenge.</p>
<p>No surprise. If the school is not challenging the kid enough, the school district won’t either, or so the parents usually reason. Parents who homeschool to challenge their children academically usually homeschool independently. Fortunately for those living in California, independent homeschooling here is legally simple.</p>
<p>“I hate the toxic and competitive environment. People are so mean and ruthless. I was diagnosed with depression this year, and my parents asked the school to be accommodating and understanding. Nope. They basically blew us off and accused me of faking depression as an excuse for having difficulties in school.”</p>
<p>I’m sorry to be blunt but you do realize that this isn’t just in high school? Wait until you enter the job market in this economy, you think school was ruthless. College and graduate school admissions (as I’m sure you can tell from this website) are incredibly cutthroat and they don’t care if you have some emotional problems, they will just throw your application and your future in the trash. I know school and people can be hard to deal with, especially during the high school years when everyone is immature but you have to realize it only gets worse once you get into the real world. You have to learn to cope and can’t run away every time someone is mean to you, unless you want to just collect disability for depression instead of working. Yes this may come off as “mean” but its getting more and more competitive out there every day and you should prepare yourself.</p>
<p>Have you looked into whether you have a “continuation” high school in your district? You should call the district office and see. My ex-husband went to one for his final year of high school and it is the only reason he graduated. Also look into whether you can study for and take your GED. See if you have an adult ed school in your area - they usually have classes for your GED. You could then go to cc until you are ready to apply as a transfer student.</p>
<p>I’m with the NY mom. I would not have you go another day there. I strongly disagree with IvyLeaf – there are lots of communities and workplaces that are NOT cutthroat environments. Ever visit a yarn shop or quilting fabric store? Talk about warm, creative worlds! My local Les Schwab tire store is full of young people that are motivated and hard working. The short hair cuts are a bit 1950’s ish but it’s clear that people are there to provide a service and are proud to do so. </p>
<p>One of the challenges in high school are the lack of options. If a student was a jerk to you on a college campus, you could change classes, drop the course, report the student – lots of choices. But high school? Some administrator tells you to “work it out” and you are stuck with jerk-o making your every day a misery. </p>
<p>A positive thing you can do is a look back over recent weeks and recognize where things went wrong. If there was an incident (or more) when your anger or actions made the situation worse, now is the time to do a postmortem and come up with alternatives that are in your mental tool chest for future use. </p>
<p>Was it Ben Franklin who said “Only an idiot repeats an action and expects a different outcome”? Get thee to a new horizon and start growing again. Good luck!</p>
