During her first year of high school my darling daughter failed three classes and received incompletes in two others. With a record like that you have two options: stay in the same grade for another year or summer school. Hello, summer school! There are two, possibly three ways to handle summer school. One way is to take the courses offered through the community college. The other is a correspondence course. Megan needs to take and pass Algebra I and English to move on to tenth grade. I’m not good at math (never ever was). Tim is, but with his work schedule he isn’t home that much. So, we decided to enroll Meg in the community college Algebra class and do the English course by correspondence (I was a journalism major so I might be a little helpful there).
Enter a major kink in the plans. I got a call from the community college today. Mid-term grades are in. Meg’s got a 36%. She does her homework, but fails her tests and the teacher commented that he doesn’t feel she puts forth her best effort. She doesn’t ask questions or get help. Ever. Great. I have talked to her and talked to her about how she needs to ask questions when she doesn’t understand. Yeah, yeah, she knows. She doesn’t want to be a freshman again so I just don’t get it. Why doesn’t she ask for help? As it looks, it will take a miracle for her to pass.
So, what comes next? I don’t know. I was going to order the English packet this weekend so it’d be here to start right after the algebra class finished. If she fails algebra, there’s no huge push to get the class made up during the summer. She needs both classes to move on. I suppose we could try to do both courses by corespondence. I’m pretty sure one of us would not survive the experience. There are also the learning centers to consider, but they are so expensive. You have to have an "evaluation" first which costs a large chunk of change and then they do offer summer school, but if that doesn’t cost one huge sum, then I’m sure they charge by the hour like they do for tutoring….and we’re talking around $40/hr!
What to do, what to do?
I wish I had an answer for you. But the truth is Megan alone has the answers. If she doesn’t want to learn there is not much you can do. She will be stuck being a Freshman. But it is her choice.
Comment by Dr. John — July 6, 2007 @ 6:38 pm
I also wish I had an answer for you… I’ll be thinking of you!
Comment by Rachel — July 7, 2007 @ 8:16 am
wow, that sucks.
It WILL get better, and answers tend to appear. Stay strong. xoxo
Comment by MamaLee — July 7, 2007 @ 9:02 pm
I hesitate to comment since I don’t know you or your daughter.
But my gut reaction is, “let her fail.”
By the time she is 30 it won’t have made much of a difference. People even out.
But she will learn that actions (and inactions) have consequences. That’s a more valuable lesson than Algebra!
Comment by Marie — July 8, 2007 @ 1:35 am
OMG - brings back memories (not pleasant ones). I nearly tore my hair out getting my son through the first two years of highschool. I finally learned what ‘Marie’ is talking about - and told him that I couldn’t keep fighting with him, threatening him, punishing, or losing sleep trying to figure out the answer - that it was on him. And I let go. He’s 35 now, married with 4 kids - and it all seems like a lifetime ago that we went through that. Hang on, Stacy, however you get it handled - “this too shall pass”.
Comment by Jackie — July 11, 2007 @ 6:17 pm