WILL FLVS HURT ME?

Applying to College
1

<p>I'm a freshman in highschool and Florida resident and am given the option of FLVS which is an online based school that you submit work through online and talk to teachers on the phone. I love my school and teachers, but my family is in bad shape and we move about 4-6 times a month, making it very difficult for me to stay organized and we usually live in small rooms and my mom snores or gets home late or my brother plays on his computer or insists on watching TV until very late and i get virtually no sleep and miss first period all the time and am still tired. My grades have suffered from this drastically, and I'm very scared that I might not even get into the UF (a school i could maybe even get a full ride to if this wasn't the situation), let alone a great school out of state that I'd prefer like CUNY, NYU, or JHU. I will be taking all APs unless they don't offer it (I'll take Honors) and am a fast learner/worker. I plan on going back to physical school once the situation stabilizes, but if not, will a virtual school diploma be as credible? So with all of this, would FLVS be ideal? I'm going to take English 2 Honors, AP Bio, APUSH, Spanish 1 and 2 honors (I'm fluent but didn't work for schedule this year), and Algebra 2 honors but will probably do PreCalc Honors and AP Psychology too during the year next year. Do you know anything about these courses? And would going back senior year be ideal? Thanks.</p>

<p>As far as SAT/ACT I'm a good test taker and have never gotten below 99% on ITBS. I took the ACT as part of the TIP Honors program for Duke in 7th grade and got 11/12 on the reading and I think like 9 on Science and i don't remember what I got in Math but it was probably low considering I was in Pre-Algebra at the time, but in all yes I am a good testtaker and intend on preparing early anyways. </p>

2

<p>I am very sorry about your home situation. You need to make sure that FLVS is an accredited online program and accepted by the colleges that you are looking at. A friend of ours had to start a completely new expensive home-school on-line program because the one he had been with for junior high was not accepted at many colleges. I tried googling FLVS and I still am not positive that CUNY or NYU would accept your courses. It sounds like the courses at FLVS would first be transferred back to your local high school?? Re your ACT scores, 9 or 11/12 are not considered high scores … they are scored up to a high of 36… so make sure you have checked all of your boxes before making a decision that could significantly impact your future. I would recommend that you take someone like a guidance counselor, principal or teacher into confidence and ask for help figuring this out.</p>

3

<p>It is an accredited program and grants diplomas. I see how I was unclear about the ACT scores and to verify I scored 11 out of a possible 12 on reading and 9 out of a possible 12 on science and do not remember my exact score for Math, but being at a pre-algebra level in 7th grade I assume it was not very good and will definitely have a higher score when I retake it upon applying to colleges. These scores were for the Duke TIP program not college admission or anything, I was just saying because I know many kids with high GPAs who have a hard time getting into a good colleges because of lack of prep on the tests, and I didn’t want comments to say “it’s all about the tests” or anything apart from the subject matter of school. Thanks for the tips! And what are the programs your friend was/is using?</p>

4

<p>We have utilized FLVS Classic as well as FLVS Full-time Home Ed. You don’t need you worry whether your courses will be accepted. They will. My son’s transcript for his college applications was composed of three years of FLVS Classic and FLVS Full-time Home Ed coursework, and he has four full scholarships to choose from right now, and if he had wanted to apply to any Florida schools, he would have been awarded scholarships in addition to Bright Futures. He does also test in the 99th percentile and had a high GPA and high SAT/ACT scores. All of those factors combined to support his academic ability, and the majority of his FLVS classes were more rigorous than what he would have taken at the local school. He took tons of honors and AP courses - FLVS offers all that you want and need.</p>

<p>That said, we have been homeschooling for a long time. So our lives are organized around homeschooling, and with FLVS Classic, but especially with FLVS Full-time Home Ed (the non diploma program) or the FLVS Full-time Public (you can earn a bonafide Florida diploma), you will have six or seven teachers to work with but the program requires you to have a Learning Coordinator who is overseeing your school day and tracking and reporting attendance and monitoring your progress. That is usually a parent. Is your mom going to be available to serve as your learning coordinator? Would she be available to speak with your teachers for your monthly calls and calls for discussion-based assessments? She would have to complete some training herself with the full-time diploma option. Would she be willing to do this?</p>

<p>As far as your daily routine, especially pursuing the diploma-granting option, would you have access to a computer and internet for several hours a day? The coursework is challenging, and it is easy to get burnt out having to work on the computer so much. With your frequent moves, would you have regular access to a computer and internet?</p>

<p>I am not trying you discourage you. You have a lot to deal with and I admire your maturity and your willingness to try to solve so many issues on your own. I just know that the full-time FLVS programs are very intense and require parent participation and without constant access to computers and the internet, would be impossible to pursue. </p>

<p>We do the full-time Home Ed FLVS because my kids did not want to be limited to playing sports at just their assigned school, otherwise we might have considered the Full-time Public option. I would not recommend the full-time Home Ed version to you because there is a lot of homeschooling-related paperwork that has to be dealt with. If you enroll in the full-time public FLVS, you are actually a public school student enrolled in a virtual school district, rather than your current district. By the way, your school district probably offers its own virtual school now using its own teachers, so something to ask about.</p>

<p>Now, I have shared a lot but what I really want to encourage you to do is go speak with your guidance counselor about your situation as soon as you can. If you are dealing with serial homelessness, there are programs to help. We don’t want you to have to deal with truancy issues if you can’t get yourself to your current school on a regular basis or keep up with work. If you enroll in FLVS Full-time Public, you still have to be concerned with truancy as they require your learning coordinator to record attendance and if you get off pace (which is easy to do given the challenge of the curriculum but also the distractions of life), they are quick to intervene. My inclination is for you to pursue some help at your current school and via the social services resources they might be able to connect you with right now.</p>

<p>You need stability first, and sharing your concerns with your guidance counselor would be a great benefit to you. They want to help you succeed, and I know that they could help you and your family deal with the struggles that are interfering with your education right now, and will continue to interfere unless the situation improves.</p>

<p>If they can help with your home life, and you stay at your current school, then I recommend you sign up for one FLVS Classic class this summer to try it out. Taking HOPE (health and PE) is a good one because you have to take the class anyway to graduate in Florida; if you take it via FLVS Classic, it frees up an elective at your school during your sophomore year; and the class is so easy you can get done in the summer rather than having to sit in a semester long version at your current school. Taking Drivers Ed is also a good one, or any of the fine arts or other electives. FLVS Classic is open to all Florida students, and is the original Florida Virtual School, but just does not offer the diploma. </p>

<p>But first, go see that counselor, or your principal or some other teacher you trust at your school and let them help you.</p>

5

<p>Wow thank you so much! I would be doing the public school option, so that wouldn’t need a parent overseer right? I will probably be doing many of my classes while my mom is working or sleeping. Yes, I do have a laptop so I will be able to work anythere there’s wifi. I am taking HOPE right now at my highschool. Also, if I do FLVS I plan on working on weekends. As far as moving around, it’s a complicated situation, but it’s not really something that can be helped with financially. I have talked to the guidance counselors at my school about the living situation and they said it was just fine and called me “unwilling” and implied I was spoiled because I was living in a hotel room at the time. </p>

6

<p>I am so sorry your guidance counselors are not helpful and so narrow-minded. That is disappointing. Here is a website from Seminole County, and even if you don’t live in Seminole, the services described should be available to you in whatever Florida county you live: <a href=“http://www.seminolehomelesskids.org”>www.seminolehomelesskids.org</a></p>

<p>Take a look at the link for “Homeless Student Rights.” You will see the laws that are supposed to protect your rights and describe what your school district must do to help you. There should be an available social worker available to help you, especially if your guidance counselors won’t. So don’t give up hope. Start at that website and then search for a similar one based in your county.</p>

<p>Now, back to the virtual school, you sound very responsible and understand that you are going to have to be your own advocate. Even for the public full-time program, you have to have an adult who signs up as your learning coordinator but how that works In the reality of your day to day life is for you and your mom to work together to implement. Your mom does not have to sit with you as you do your work but she will need to be available at times to talk with your teachers and you need to make sure she is prepared to talk with them and not trigger any problems. If you think you can take full responsibility for keeping yourself on track with the assignments, and never getting in a position that would cause the administration or your teachers to be concerned that you are not keeping up, and so they want to discuss everything with your mom, then there shouldn’t be any problems. Just stay on top of things. Don’t give them extra reasons to talk with your mom. Your mom would have to sign you up and send in the application, and will need to set up her account she is supposed to record your daily attendance and mark your work as completed, but you can help her with all of that. </p>

<p>I don’t grade my kids’ work as the teachers do that, but as my kids complete assignments, those go into pending status and I have to log in to my account and mark them completed. I also record attendance and monitor their overdue lists. That said, you and your mom could come to an agreement about how the two of you would handle this so that you don’t trigger any concerns from the school but you can help her do this everyday.</p>

<p>If you think your mom will work with you to get you signed up and you help her go through the Learning Coordinator training ( not difficult at all and just ensures your mom knows how to log in, etc), and you think your living situation would provide enough support (perhaps working during the day at the local library), then the program could work for you. The curriculum is challenging and will prepare you well for college. You will be a step ahead of some students because you would be mastering how to work independently. You will have live lesson opportunities every week and collaboration opportunities with other students. You will have club opportunities and you can participate in both FLVS full-time activities as well as anything offered via FLVS Classic (leadership opps, tutoring, writing, etc)</p>

<p>I meant to add that you can certainly work on school whenever you want, 24 hours, 7 days, on holidays, etc, but for the purpose of recording your attendance, just make sure to record at least 6 hours a day Monday through Friday (and your days will take at least 6 hours of work to stay on top of things.) Don’t ever take an absence, because you have to provide the same kind of documentation as you do at the regular school in order to get an excused absence. Track the hours you work on the weekends, and as long as the amount of work you are turning in makes sense for the hours recorded, then no problem. </p>

<p>If you have additional questions, don’t hesitate to ask. Take care.</p>