If she has a disability then a 504 is appropriate not an out. I don't think its fair to want to take AP away from kid's who are willing to meet the challenge just because your child doesn't want a challenge but still wants to be with the kid's who do.

I (Not OP, the follow-on poster) don't want to take AP away. With this push to get on the "best schools" rankings it just seems like any kid halfway motivated is put in AP classes. Even if it's AP english and they are planning to be an engineer who plays soccer and violin, or whatever and have very little interest in English. Honors are now General Ed and General Ed is special ed. Why can't AP be a little more selective? and then honors for otherwise college bound kids, general ed and IEP/504 kids slotted in where it's appropriate? And have most kids take AP in the areas of strongest interest. My child surely qualifies for a 504, but I don't want to do other AP students a disservice by having a kid not really quite there academically, even if in classroom discussions you wouldn't notice a difference. The difference in having a class where not quite so much volume of written output is expected rather than always asking to be the exception and hoping for a co-operative teacher. (reading the descriptions the writing expectation seems to be a big differentiation.)

I know, silly. When every other parent wants their child to go to an Ivy it's 100% AP all the way. It's not going to change. We'll muddle through somehow. It just seems to be a issue for more kids apart from our special problem. AP has been promoted as a way to close the racial achievement gap, so they admit any interested student. I just think that it's had some unintended side effects.

What is your daughter's writing issue? Is it a physical issue? Have you consulted an OT?

It seems more, from her testing, to be a language learning disability. After a few years of concentrated work, she's mostly remediated her reading issue, but the writing/spelling issues have lingered. She's perfectionist and anxious, so when she can't be positive she'll spelling it correctly, the output slows way way down. She also gets frustrated when her physical writing can't keep pace with her train of thought, might have some sort of memory/executive function element to that. We hope in the long term a laptop will help, but right now when it's mostly transcription and taking dictation, it's just as frustrating.

AP's can be a huge money saver. Many kids get a year's worth of college credit and need only three years of undergraduate education. That's such a coup, assuming your child can deal with the stress. AP's are not required. If it's too much stress, make sure your kid doesn't take any AP classes. Do what's right for your own child and I'll do what's right for mine.

I'm guessing my kids will take some AP courses, but I will never volunteer that kind of detail to other parents. My kids are in school, they like this teacher or this club, fine. I'm not going to start rattling off their GPA or SAT scores.
However, I'm sure there are parents that will.
I remember when my kids where in preschool, the topic of conversation at pick up was where you kids was on reading.
Yes, I said preschool.
I just hate that parents use their children to satisfy their own competitive nature.
As far as I'm concerned, the anti-AP mom is competitive too. She just wants to eliminate things that might make other folks' kids look better than hers. It has nothing to do with what is ultimately best for her kid or the other peoples' kids.
Ugh. I just refuse to engage.

I don't really get the whole AP thing either.

Some moms have their kids taking a bazillion AP classes to impress colleges. My neighbor just sent her son to college instead. He takes the one English credit required for senior year and then takes college classes and the credits will transfer.

I am sure I will get sucked into the AP game too. Such is life.

It'll probably never happen, so you can smile at your friend and ignore her.

Top colleges are looking for kids who take the most challenging classes available to them. Colleges are also well aware, as a PP noted, that AP/IB are the new "Honors," and Honors are the new "on-level." So if school districts eliminate AP/IB, they would have to revamp their entire curricula to introduce a whole new, challenging path of study for kids who want/need more challenge. I'm not necessarily opposed to this, depending on the implementation ... but it's not gonna happen. I also have some sympathy for the Race to Nowhere arguments about how we're burning our kids out. But frankly, if you revamp the curriculum and call it something else, you will still have the same competition among the high-achieving kids, just with a different name. I say this as the parent of two high-achieving kids, the oldest of whom is now at an ivy.

As long as the College Board offers AP tests (and it's a huge money maker as another PP pointed out), kids will feel they have to take AP tests to impress colleges, whether their HS offers AP or not. You see some of this at DC area private high schools which don't offer AP (Maret) or offer fewer AP classes, but most of the kids take the AP tests in April anyway. Heck, at RM's IB program lots of kids take the science and math APs.

So the parents of high-achieving kids would fight OP's whiny friend tooth and nail. It's like saying, you high-flying kids should agree to be mediocre so my child has an equal chance if getting into the school of her choice.

I've never noticed any 'mommy wars' regarding AP classes, but then again most of the parents I know have kids who are on the AP track. There are some parents, though who want to start the IB vs. AP argument, as a PP mentioned.

My kids have learned a lot from AP classes, and we will be reaping the benefits in the fall, when DS gets to opt out of some college courses because of his AP scores. How that is considered a bad thing is beyond me.

OP's friend sounds like a real pill. She has no way of knowing what level her DD will be at when she is in h.s. I've seen kids who were underachievers in elementary school go on to be excellent students by the time they are in high school. OP's friend should zip it and should focus on letting her daughter know she is loved no matter what.

It's interesting, talking with a mom with HS now, she didn't really know where things were. Her son isn't that interested in academics so he's in howard county honors classes instead of AP and the common denominator in there is atrocious. So you either have kids barely in school and not at all motivated, or you're in AP. There doesn't seem to be much middle ground, at least in their high school.

This concerns me since I have a very intellectual kid with some writing issues so IB and AP classes will be extremely difficult. But if she's going to get any intellectual challenge, that's where she needs to be? I have no idea what we will do when we get there. I don't want to 504 her way out of the writing, but her output will probably always be very slow and labored and a fraction of what her peers can churn out. I think IB will be her worst nightmare, since it seems to require even more writing.

If she has a disability then a 504 is appropriate not an out. I don't think its fair to want to take AP away from kid's who are willing to meet the challenge just because your child doesn't want a challenge but still wants to be with the kid's who do.

Anonymous wrote:It's interesting, talking with a mom with HS now, she didn't really know where things were. Her son isn't that interested in academics so he's in howard county honors classes instead of AP and the common denominator in there is atrocious. So you either have kids barely in school and not at all motivated, or you're in AP. There doesn't seem to be much middle ground, at least in their high school.

This concerns me since I have a very intellectual kid with some writing issues so IB and AP classes will be extremely difficult. But if she's going to get any intellectual challenge, that's where she needs to be? I have no idea what we will do when we get there. I don't want to 504 her way out of the writing, but her output will probably always be very slow and labored and a fraction of what her peers can churn out. I think IB will be her worst nightmare, since it seems to require even more writing.

What is your daughter's writing issue? Is it a physical issue? Have you consulted an OT?

My 15yo son has significant gross- and fine-motor issues and we have consulted with an OT over the years. The main issues were: poor muscle tone in his hands and lower arms (and consequent spidery/indecipherable writing); poor hand/eye coordination; and problematic pencil grip. These caused fatigue in the writing process, which contributed to an (understandable) reluctance to produce any more writing than the absolute bare minimum. Moreover, when writing he had developed a very ingrained bad habit of flexing his wrist inward rather than extending it (the ideal is a 15 degree extension), which, left unaddressed, would eventually have resulted in carpal tunnel problems. In high school, this is a huge problem - handwriting is very important (no matter what classes you are in, IMO).

Anyway, the OT prescribed daily strengthening exercises using hand and finger exerciser gadgets, and subsequently, writing exercises. As you can imagine, his teenage self has not always been, um, enthusiastic about the whole thing. It has been a long road, but oh, so worth it - he was recently re-evaluated and passed all the tests with flying colors. His handwriting is still not great, but it is legible, and most importantly, he is no longer shrinking away from writing whatever amount he needs or wants to because of how laborious/difficult it is for him (which used to be the case).

It's interesting, talking with a mom with HS now, she didn't really know where things were. Her son isn't that interested in academics so he's in howard county honors classes instead of AP and the common denominator in there is atrocious. So you either have kids barely in school and not at all motivated, or you're in AP. There doesn't seem to be much middle ground, at least in their high school.

This concerns me since I have a very intellectual kid with some writing issues so IB and AP classes will be extremely difficult. But if she's going to get any intellectual challenge, that's where she needs to be? I have no idea what we will do when we get there. I don't want to 504 her way out of the writing, but her output will probably always be very slow and labored and a fraction of what her peers can churn out. I think IB will be her worst nightmare, since it seems to require even more writing.

Anonymous wrote:IB is better than AP

Depends entirely on which school and which teachers. Don't want to have the AP v. IB debate here (although it looks like you want to), but I could name some great AP teachers and some local IB schools that are meh. Either program can be good, or bad, depending on how it's taught.

I'm surprised you haven't encountered this in elementary school with the anti-TAG crowd. They don't want to accept that some children need further instruction to be challenged and bitch a lot about resources going toward TAG-identified kids on the grounds that parents are pushing the kids beyond their capabilities.

Anonymous wrote:I have a friend who thinks school is too stressful and wants the school board to do away with all AP classes. She wants to feel happy that her kid is just average or even slightly below and doesn't want her kid to feel bad that she isn't taking AP classes. She thinks this means that there shouldn't be AP classes for anyone. Her kid is years away from high school so I'm not sure why she is so into this but she is arguing with other moms who think AP classes are good. She keeps making judgmental comments about how they are just pushing their kids.

My kids are in middle school so we haven't thought about this yet and don't really care right now but her comments reminded me of all the mommy war stuff from infancy..CIO vs co-sleeping, formula vs breastfeeding, WOHM vs SAHM. It may be her personality and she was one of the few people I knew in real life that made judgmental comments about parenting stuff when the kids were little but is this something to look forward down the road? Do the mommy parenting wars restart when the kid's start getting older again?

She is trying to "keep up with the Jones's and is afraid how she will look in the community. There is no law that says the girl has to take AP classes.

IB is better than AP

AP is the new Honors and also an absolute money making racket for The College Board.

I have a friend who thinks school is too stressful and wants the school board to do away with all AP classes. She wants to feel happy that her kid is just average or even slightly below and doesn't want her kid to feel bad that she isn't taking AP classes. She thinks this means that there shouldn't be AP classes for anyone. Her kid is years away from high school so I'm not sure why she is so into this but she is arguing with other moms who think AP classes are good. She keeps making judgmental comments about how they are just pushing their kids.

My kids are in middle school so we haven't thought about this yet and don't really care right now but her comments reminded me of all the mommy war stuff from infancy..CIO vs co-sleeping, formula vs breastfeeding, WOHM vs SAHM. It may be her personality and she was one of the few people I knew in real life that made judgmental comments about parenting stuff when the kids were little but is this something to look forward down the road? Do the mommy parenting wars restart when the kid's start getting older again?