Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Ugh... what to do, if anything...

Thanks everyone.



This really helps me to frame things in my mind. I think that while there are a number of reasons why this practice upsets me, the NATURE of the practice is lazy/incompetent teacher communication.

Teachers shouldn't be resorting to using the two-by-four between the eyes method as a FIRST point of contact when they've not yet made expectations clear, and have no notion at all how something like that will be received by parents or students. KWIM? Practices like that are pretty old-school, and nobody uses brutality in classrooms anymore-- even at the college level.

This is a schooling model that is SUPPOSED to be flexible and it therefore attracts disproportionate numbers of students who are non-NT, are HG, have an elite training schedule that takes up HUGE blocks of time, a family seasonal obligation that requires flexible scheduling, or have serious medical problems that would otherwise keep them from attending school regularly. (Truly, I think that my DD has known only 2 or 3 other kids in all of her years with them who DID NOT have some 'story' about why they are with the school)

I can't really see this being a good way to "communicate" with any of those groups of students-- or their parents. Not without even checking in first.

I've also talked to DD (who admits that the 85% on last exam was quite possibly panic-driven because of the temporary zero) about the need to simply work about a week AHEAD in both math classes so that she can continue to work as she prefers. The only problem with that is that she also needs to keep up with everything ELSE, due to the synchronous instruction (what little there is of it-- she doesn't want to miss ANY of it) in her other classes.

I'll also add that working too far ahead is also FROWNED UPON fairly steeply in the program. While we are told that they are "flexible" and that students can "work at their own pace" what that actually SEEMS to mean is that they can "work on the computer at any time of the day" and "complete each day's work whenever they want to within that 24 hour period." Which is totally not what the official answer to those questions happens to be, by the way...

I'm actually fed up with a LOT of things this year. SO glad it's our last. No WAY would I go to bat for these turkeys with the legislature or state BoE at this point in time. No way.

IMO, they are making it increasingly difficult to justify their program as a viable alternative to kids that have difficulty with B&M settings.

Two other factors important to note:


1. Panic isn't necessarily an unreasonable response in an achievement-oriented student. The majority of teachers at the school use the "temporary" zero as a close precursor to the PERMANENT one... and the timeline on conversion is highly variable (could be 24 hours, even, or maybe never-- you don't know WHAT it means unless the teacher says so).

2. Students can't actually "use" the gradebook as a means of immediate feedback on course performance (the stated intended purpose of making it available to students in the first place) because that information's obscured as long as there are temporary zeros in place... and this teacher is notorious for ZEROING OUT THE ENTIRE COURSE-- (in advance) that is, you won't know how you did until you complete the final, unless you're willing to painstakingly calculate it yourself, I mean... and assuming that the weighting isn't shifting under you because of invalidated items on assessments (which happens-- honestly, that gradebook IS the only way to know-- I know, because I've tried doing it the other way in the past... there is some bit of weighting info that is not available to parents/students.


So yes-- I do believe that this practice is a GROSS escalation of communication and should be used more judiciously and never without communication to parents.

Some students are required to submit weekly progress reports to play club athletics here. Some may have parents who immediately resort to fairly punitive measures for any grade which is less than __________. Frankly, in my own home as a child, this would have led directly to ABUSE. Any explanation from ME would have been "excuses" which would be worthy of additional verbal/physical "punishment." My grades HAD to be acceptable or it would set one of my parents off, in a big way. Anyone else live in fear of the "call home" or the "note from the teacher" about a classroom infraction as a child? No? Well, welcome to life in a home with an abusive parent-- the ONLY good news from school is news that is bland and doesn't make waves. These teachers have ZERO way to know who those kids are by virtue of the environment (virtual), but statistically, they are out there in the same virtual classes that my DD is in.

So I have grave concerns that don't involve my OWN child at all.

This would make a good point for advocacy, IMO. A self-determining student taking responsibility for their own education is empowered by knowing how their performance is being evaluated grade-wise, and some may use this information as a time-management tool. For example: determining whether to put three extra hours into refining a paper for one class, or studying for another. Having an accurate and timely online grade book, proactive schedule of due-dates, and clear late policy are information which benefits ALL students, as well as educators, and the educational institution. You may wish to help DD process all this and draft an advocacy e-mail. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

It is probably ignorance not malice. How about explaining to him then when that doesn't work making a formal submission higher up the food chain. In the mean time maybe your daughter shouldn't look at her grades.

Puffin, that is exactly what we (all three of us) have decided. After talking to two other parents who have scrabbled their way through classes with this guy, it's LIKELY to be a no-win situation in direct contact, and *may* make things even worse for my DD...

but in the end, we're short-timers with our eyes on the prize.

The end justifies the means at some point when the system itself becomes clearly irrational. If you see what I mean.

I care that she LEARNS from her two math classes-- I want the best possible foundation coming out of those two experiences, and anything that doesn't serve that end is going under the bus. Period.

I also care that she learn from one of her other classes (this is the other area which is both redeemable in curricular terms and has a good teacher running the show).

Beyond that, we care only that her last year of high school not DAMAGE her future.

She's eager and MORE than ready for college.

I felt awful when I picked her up yesterday; she sat in on a 200-ish level Honors class (invited as part of the interview process) and the professor was clearly enthusiastic and DELIGHTED to have her there as an active participant. I was not involved at all in anything but providing her with transportation. She IS independent and ready.

It just was a huge letdown for Cinderella to come back to earth and realize that the ball was over and that she was back to the rats and pumpkin. She told me yesterday in a kind of sad wistful voice that the professor described his grading process as a rational, holistic thing-- not a rubric or multiple choice question, or five-sentence "essay" in sight. Class discussions are about presenting deep thinking and responding thoughtfully to others in response to the GROUP experience with the readings. She was in HEAVEN.

So she knows that the light at the end of the tunnel is daylight-- not a train. She's just got to do what it takes to get there. I'm so done with this school.

This sounds suitable for a humanities or sociology course such as philosophy of ethics and technology... but less applicable to math and science courses such as accounting, statistics, microbiology, advanced anatomy and physiology. The former may be highly subjective in their grading; the latter are by necessity objective and require great accuracy.

Depending on her planned major(s)/minor(s), not all courses may be similar to the one she sat in on.

Yes, she's aware-- she lives with a pair of PhD physical scientists, after all.

What she really appreciated about it was the lack of superficial, shallow CRAP masquerading as "learning" at the high school level, the level of interactive engagement and intelligence of the other students (19-22yo honors students-- who are also mostly STEM majors at this institution). Personally, I'm pretty pleased by her readiness level, having been a science faculty member. She can THINK, and she's not afraid to defend those thoughts, or use them to explore further. She can remember content, but she can do a lot more than that, too, and she's tired of memorizing being shilled as "deep learning."

Remember, this is the set of geniuses that brought us (for an AP high school literature course, mind you):

T/F Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein for Lord Byron.

{head-desk}

Hopefully she has stories which illustrate this... if she may need a definitive example to discuss during interviews, there remains that opportunity to advocate regarding the student gradebook, due dates, and late policy...

How did she answer that question?

She said "no"; In a growth mindset that may be seen as "not yet"...