I didn't make it to church today but DH did. He said our highschool girl came up to him and said that she's not in school because they refused to test her and place her! The school said it was because I'm not accredited. She was outraged that they wanted her to go in at beginning 9th grade, and she refused to do it. I TOLD her mom back before she enrolled with us, that had happened with others I knew of, but when she told me in May that she would be going back, she said she would have to bite the bullet because she needs to be with other kids and if that's what she'll have to do, then that's what she'll have to do. Now the girl says she's NOT going back in 9th grade. I'm going to talk with them this week, and help them get hooked up with CLE's Homeschool Plus. I have her 9th and 10th grade records, so she can go in as a junior. I'm also going to offer for her to come to our house, if not for all subjects at least for some stuff IF SHE WANTS. Have you ever heard of a public school NOT taking a student from anywhere? Refusing to test/place?
She was my last one, besides my grandson. I was hoping to graduate her, and then I would have closed down anyway. Except for my grandson, and his little brother when he gets started.
That is how it is here. It is common. 8th great is the fork in the road. You have to pick a direction. You generally cannot simply switch sides. If you try to start after that here, they will make you start at 8th grade, even if you are 17 yrs old.
Here, too, Maybe. That's why we let Elle give it a try in eighth grade to make up her mind which way she wanted to go for high school. Starting high school is a Big fork in the road with big roadblocks if you try to mix and match. (It's problematic here, anyway. I know all states handle this differently..crossing fingers that Lindina's state is more accomidating) From what I understand from another home school family...to get public school high school credit for any class (where we live), the class has to be taught by a licensed teacher using a state board of education approved curriculum (again, will vary by state) with documentation of hours of instruction. If you came up short of credits for graduation.....there's no reason you couldn't write a home school diploma. If you know she's done and has what she needs, that's enough for a home school diploma. But to get the public school diploma, you've gotta jump through the public school hoops. Sure hope they work with her, Lindina, and give her credit for at least some of her home school. Good luck.
I know there are some other folks around here whose kids transferred to public school in high school. Could any of you guys tell us how the whole credit transfer thing worked for you?
In NYS you could not easily transfer from hs'ing to a ps for high school without having to start back in 9th grade. Students have to take regents tests in the state. If you are coming from homeschooling you could take some of those in Aug. but they do not offer all of them and if there is a conflict in subjects you could only take one. They also do not offer all the science test in the summer, plus there is a lab portion of the test and most schools will not take homeschool labs as equivalent. So in NYS unless you plan to go to a private hs friendly high school, if you start hs'ing in 9th grade you go all the way through 12th.
And not only that, but the uni she wants to go to has changed their policies (I think the state has, actually, and now federal) that you can't get in and can't get funding without doing State-approved home study program, which is going to follow the Core 4 program, which MAY not work for her because of the required courses - 4 of everything. I'm not seeing it possible to finish algebra I, then do algebra II, geometry, and trig. Ain't happening. However, she could take a GED and go in, if she has a decent ACT score. She could (according to the two-year college's catalog), still get in by taking the Compass, do two years there getting all her general courses, then transfer to the uni as a Junior. OR go ahead and finish my diploma which is accredited in the Homeschool Plus program with CLE. We might still be able to complete that. I don't know what's on their minds at this point. They MIGHT be busily convincing her to go back in 9th grade....
That really sucks....I'm not sure what the laws are here about that..I have an 8th grader..and I'm using an accredited program...If it's that big of a deal...I think I'd just continue to homeschool and help her apply for college when /if the time came.
As long as she is in compliance with state homeschooling laws she is eligible for federal funding. Now admittance to the University is something else. I do not think they can legally deny her admittance on the basis of homeschooling if she has met their requirements and homeschooled legally. I would be interested in what university she is looking to attend.
For us, we had to pay for private school for 8th grade to have her placed in 9th grade. Otherwise, in the past, they make the kids go all the way back to the grade they left off. They do it to make an example of home schoolers to be a show of threat to prevent home schoolers. Then they go around and tell everyone the home schoolers are so far behind, they had to back them up all those grades. When I pulled my children out going in to 3rd grade, I was told they would be sent back to 2nd grade (which they cannot legally make them repeat a grade, so they could only legally put them back to 3rd) if I did homeschool, regardless of when I return them, even if I returned them at 13 or 14 yrs old. And they do just that. I have seen 13 and 14 yr olds try to enrolled and get told they have to start in grade school, even early grade school. No sane parent would put their child through that.
That sounds crazy, Maybe. (I'm sure it happened to you...but wow, that's just nutty! Sorry you had to experience this and jump through hoops) Elle had no problem joining up in 8th grade. I called the school in about April, and said I wanted her to start in the fall with the new school year. They do seem to appreciate plenty of heads-up. Since I'd never kept scores or had grades or anything, I told them they'd probably want to test her to place her in whatever grade they felt she would do best. I figured they might try her in seventh...which didn't bother either of us (Elle is short and tiny, she'd be fine socially with younger kids). They asked if she had any learning disabilities, I said no. They asked if I would bring her in for the state assessment test with the seventh graders who would be in eighth grade with her in the fall. So she attended school with a seventh grade class for three days in May while they were taking the tests. For lunch, they actually assigned three girls to "be her buddies" and show her around, help her get lunch, keep her company. (Which I thought was incredibly considerate and sweet) She did the assessment testing, and scored in the 98th percentile on everything. The school seemed really pleased, and put her in accelerated Algebra One for high school credit in 8th grade, and honors English. She got all A's her first semester....and that was pretty much the trend for the rest of her public school career. They didn't give us any problems at all transferring into 8th grade. They never asked for records of any sort. BUT....I know that K-8 plays by a different rule book than 9-12 here. There's more wiggle room for adjusting elementary to skill level (when I was in elementary school, I skipped 3rd grade...it was common to do this back then to try to keep kids engaged and interested) But 9-12 is all about getting the diploma, and there are a ton of state and federal regulation about what a public school diploma MUST mean now. They definitely have very specific hoops to jump through....that they'll make you jump through by extension. I was given a little warning at the end of eighth grade that we should commit to either public school or home school for her highschool years....that it would be difficult to mix them because they would be limited in how much credit they could offer her for homeschool classes. They were really nice about....but wanted to give me ample warning. Luckily, Elle so enjoyed school, she was all about going to public school for all of high school....so I never ended up facing the dilemma. I think how much trouble they give you depends on a few factors: How homeschool friendly your state is. If your school district is over crowded. If your school district WANTS more students. When we signed Elle up for eighth grade....the economy had just tanked and a TON of people were moving away from our area. Our small poor school district was desperate for students. Each kid they lost....was a lost paycheck. Elle was a new paycheck. It was as simple as that. They welcomed her with open arms. I think high school is going to be a headache in most states... But if you're trying to get your kid appropriately placed in elementary and you run into the situation that Maybe described....try again with a free charter school. If you live in a school of choice state, try a poor district school that NEEDS the money your kid will bring. Someone SHOULD work with you for K-8. But yeah...9-12...gets trickier.
I remember having a long discussion with the head of one of the accreditation bodies. As I remember, it's schools that are accredited, not individual teachers. For example, if a school chooses to sign students up for an online course, the course is accredited if the school is; the school decides whether the course and the teacher meet their standards and criteria. I'm not sure how this affects your situation, but the point is that you, as such, are neither accredited nor not accredited. Schools are accredited and use whichever teachers they believe are qualified and appropriate consistent with their accreditation.
We put Rachael in ECOT (Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow, an on-line public school) at the end of her Junior year so she could take PSEO classes. I had only one or two relatively minor complaints. They accepted my transcripts without any hassles. Honestly, I'm not sure they can legally NOT take them. I would think there's some federal regs somewhere.
They did. She is officially an ECOT graduate, not a homeschool grad. But, considering she was homeschooled 11 out of 12 years, we still consider her a homeschooled student. ECOT actually recruits homeschooled high schoolers. They do very well on the OGT (Ohio Graduation Test) and makes them look good.
Isn't it illegal? I mean to refuse to test or accept a "private school" transcript is ludicrous but there are a ton of non accredited private high schools out there ( My son went to two) and it makes no sense for a public school to refuse to test on grounds of non accreditation. When I came from Canada to the states they had very little in common with my US High School courses but they looked at my transcript and figured it out; are schools so lame today that they can't think? Sorry attitude right now myself as I found out my nephew who cannot spell worth beans is in an AP English course in Jr High.
Accreditation is not really the reason. They just don't want to deal with it. I've known kids who were doing accredited Abeka, and they wouldn't take them either.
Unfortunately, it's not something HSLDA would take on, as it's involving kids who have quit homeschooling. But I think there's a court case in the making.
