Looking for nontraditional schools — HS student struggling in public school

[Anonymous]

OP, could you please help us with what you mean when you say "nontraditional"? What are you looking for specifically? And this obviously would be for high school, correct?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hi OP!

Would your parent support you to homeschool?

Here are some resources that might supplement alternative schools.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Teenage_Liberation_Handbook

https://michiganvirtual.org/

https://www.ucscout.org/

My public school kid takes Chinese through Michigan Virtual. I am going to have him take AP Physics over the summer from UC Scout. It is cheap if you want to audit but $400 per class if you take exams, get grades, and a real transcript that you might be able to use to get credit at your public school.

Our public school does most APs through a company called Edgenuity. Kids don't seem to like it though.

There are a few more sources of online APs. Northwestern has a center for gifted youth with online APs. But you need high PSATs to qualify.

Good luck. I hope you find the right supportive environment!

How has Michigan Virtual been for foreign language? My teen wants to take Latin through there. I’ve heard they often don’t run the level 3 languages like Chinese and Latin since they need at least 10 kids per class. That would be a problem for us if we ran into that. Any insight? (Sorry to high jack, OP).

PP. My kid is in Chinese 3 through Michigan Virtual as a junior right now. His public district only offers Spanish, French, and German and they don't do a good job. He hated Spanish and had started doing Duolingo Chinese. We sent him to Concordia Language Village for a month-long summer camp after freshman year and he loved it. That's how he got credit for Chinese 1. And since that went well, we put him in Michigan Virtual Chinese 2. Which he liked. He likes online and self-paced learning. We value foreign languages a lot in our family, having studied them in college (dad a foreign language major, mom a language minor).

He says that in Chinese 3 there are not all the same kids as Chinese 2. The Chinese is offered through Michigan State University. However the instructors do not seem like professors. More like high school teachers. But they are professional and we are satisfied with that. Michigan Virtual offers up to AP Chinese so I bet they have a Chinese 4 class. However, their classes are 2 semesters at each level, with the first only taught in the fall and the second only taught in the spring. So you can't jump in off-cycle or in summer.

My kid is thinking of stopping after Chinese 3. He has some new intellectual loves and schedule pressure. I believe Concordia camp could probably be a solution for a Chinese 4 credit but he has other plans for summer. And I view it as harder to guarantee that his level would be judged as Chinese 4 for transcript purposes. Concordia is Cognia-accredited (as is our public school district) and gives grades and Parchment transcripts.

My son is not a heritage learner (=white). If he had free weekends, we might have sent him to weekend Chinese school for Chinese Americans. Even in my (not DC) metro, I know of 3. We are cool with being the outliers. Plus I know from friends that a lot of Chinese American kids don't like those classes and kinda suck at them. So I wouldn't worry about him being totally lost. I might need help filling out the registration form, though.

I'm sorry, I can't comment on Latin. I don't know what entity supports that behind Michigan Virtual. And I bet the cohort demand is less predictable.

My school district switched to Edgenuity for online APs. Said because of selection but I believe it was price. I heard bad things about their online APs from my kids' friends. They had regular Chinese through Chinese 3. I don't have a report-out on it.

I hear people talking about Virtual Virginia and that UVA loves Latin on here but have no info. Maybe start a thread?

[Anonymous]

I'm sorry you're having a tough time. However, avoiding the thing that makes you anxious (your current school) is likely to make the anxiety worse in the long run. Non traditional schools around here don't offer APs (except McLean and it would be a terrible commute and almost 60k a year) and you have less than a year and a half left. Can you focus on more/different therapy and other coping mechanisms like getting more exercise (i.e. shoveling snow)?

[Anonymous]

The New School of Northern Virginia is an incredibly welcoming environment.