Repeating a grade at high school

[Anonymous]

My son suffers from ADHD and did very poorly in all his core courses in the freshman year (all Cs or Ds). Normal IQ. (His issues started to show early on but could not be easily helped despite of our efforts -- it's a long story) He does not seek help himself so this is something we are considering as parents.

What's people's experience in grade repeat at FCPS? Thanks in advance.

[Anonymous]

He won't "repeat" the grade. They will just move heaven and earth to make sure he passes the minimum state test requirements/credits to graduate.

[Anonymous]

Public won’t allow him to repeat. The only way if you want that is to switch him to private for a year, repeat 9th, then come back to public for 10th.

[Anonymous]

Not possible. Even kids who fail everything or fall behind on credits from moving from out of state are put into accelerated catch up classes (self paced on a computer) so they can graduate on time.

In 15 years of teaching I have never seen a secondary student be held back, no matter how many classes they fail.

[Anonymous]

This is not happening in any world. Allowing him to repeat when he didn’t even fail violates all policy and would harm the school’s graduation rate as he would now not graduate with his cohort. You are being very unrealistic and should abandon this line of thinking. -hs teacher

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Public won’t allow him to repeat. The only way if you want that is to switch him to private for a year, repeat 9th, then come back to public for 10th.

No because even then, he HAS course credits in his transcript. A school CANNOT make you retake a course for which you already have a credit. He didn’t fail these classes, he just didn’t do as well as OP wanted. Your transcript goes with you when you enroll in schools you know.

[Anonymous]

No, have him retake classes in summer school AND get tutors. If money is an issue, there are affortable online tutors.

[Anonymous]

I don’t understand. Is he a freshman now and isn’t doing well and you expect him to fail or he is a sophomore and you want to go back?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t understand. Is he a freshman now and isn’t doing well and you expect him to fail or he is a sophomore and you want to go back?

He’s obviously a sophomore now. He already did freshman year. She’s asking about repeating sophomore year. I think.

[Anonymous]

In addition to all the other reasons why it wouldn’t be allowed that people have already posted, a public school system can’t afford to give kids who passed their classes an entire extra year of instruction, just to improve their GPAs.

[Anonymous]

I can't imagine the social consequences here.

[Anonymous]

It's not going to happen within FCPS. I was a teacher for many years and only saw one successful case of a kid repeating a grade (about 15 years ago) and it was a HUGE battle for the parents to make it happen and he had to change schools to do it.
You have a couple of options
1. send him to a private school and have him reclass as a sophmore next year - it's likely that only schools like McLean School and Lab school will take him on if his ADHD is that severe. The high level privates around DC will be less willing with grades that low.
2. Let him mature a little more, do junior year, and then reclass as a junior at a boarding school (this is more common than people think)
3. Let him complete all four years in FCPS and then do a post graduate year at a boarding school (again more common than people think)
4. Have him complete all four years in FCPS and then do a year or two at NOVA to get his act together (I've seen this work for numerous kids)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can't imagine the social consequences here.

they are enormous if the kid doesn't change schools. new school, not such a problem

[Anonymous]

I was going to suggest a Post-Graduate year as well. It’s very common to do one year at a boarding school and apply to college from there.

[Anonymous]

You can switch to private. You can also find online classes this summer, unofficially through private schools, pay yourself and never report them anywhere. Public schools will never have him repeat if he passed. I have students who fail and the admin and counselors do anything they can in the spring to give them bogus assignments to call it “credit recovery.” For those who don’t even do that, they magically earn credit recovery in the summer. Everyone moved on in public.

Repeating is much more common in private. Academic rigor is higher and reclassing for sports is also common at some privates. I know many who have switched to private and repeated the grade for sports. There is no social stigma at all for repeating at many privates for boys in HS, coming from public.