Any reasons (less financial aid/scholarships?) it’s NOT ok for dd to take a realllllly easy second semester senior year?

[HappyGrace]

She’s already accepted at the colleges she wants (Liberty, Cedarville, Houghton, Roberts Wesleyan). She’s been invited to their Honors programs, which she isn’t planning on doing (it’s for nursing so she doesn’t need the extra stress of Honors work). She had a 4.0 for high school and 1390 SAT, so she’s worked really hard.

 

We don’t have financial packages from the colleges yet and we DO need financial aid and scholarships-as much as possible since we have nothing to put toward her college.

 

She’s been suffering pretty serious anxiety and it would probably really help her to have an easy semester while she’s regaining her footing mentally/emotionally. She also wants to work more hours to get some money toward books and other things she’ll need.

 

Would it affect anything with the colleges and especially with financial aid if she just takes maybe two courses second semester senior year?

 

She already finished everything she needs for high school, and has several credits from college courses (online and local) as well.

 

Thanks so much!

[Reefgazer]

My DD works her tushie off; she will be taking a light senior spring semester, regardless of scholarships or anyone's else's expectations.  I say it's a good rest before college and I see nothing wrong with it.  This is coming from the person who has not graduated anyone, however.  :)

[rocassie]

As long as all requirements are met I know many seniors that have a light spring semester or even graduate in December.   I do know some that have had their college acceptance revoked due to poor grades or not obtaining certain credts that spring semester because the acceptance was contigengent on the acceptee fulfilling these obligation the last semester.

[HappyGrace]

How would we find out if acceptance is contingent? We wouldn’t want to ask the college and call attention to it.

 

I do think most places ask for a final “official†transcript, right? So they’ll definitely see that she had a light semester :(

[snowbeltmom]

When you applied to the schools, did you list what classes your D would be taking the 2nd semester?  If you did, I would be reluctant to deviate too much from those stated classes.  If you didn't have to list 2nd semester classes when applying, I would think you should be fine to have a lighter 2nd semester.

[Hilltopmom]

My ds is going to do a lighter last semester.

 

I did submit his planned classes at application time, but was pretty generic in the listing because spring course schedules weren’t out yet. So instead of listing “Spanish 102†I listed continue Spanish (we weren’t sure if he would get a spot in the reduced price DE class again or switch to Spanish at home). I also said a “Gen Ed elective to be decided when course schedules are available†to give plenty of room for decisions.

 

His classes look harder on paper by the names of them than they actually will be for him this spring. (2 DE classes that will be easy for him, an at home math, & an at home programming class)

 

Same reasons- he’s completed all of his high school requirements plus a lot of DE. His jr year was very demanding and he’d like an easier semester to rest a bit before next fall when things will be intense and he’ll be away from home.

[Milknhoney]

I work at a university admissions office. I'm sure not all offices operate the same, but most of our admissions decisions are based on the end-of-junior-year transcript. We require the final high school transcript be sent at the end of the year, but it goes straight to processing. Someone checks to make sure that the student actually graduated, and then it gets filed. If the person doing the filing notices that the final semester is full of D's and F's, they might send the file over to an admissions officer to review, but otherwise, nobody looks at it.

 

How would we find out if acceptance is contingent? We wouldn’t want to ask the college and call attention to it.

I do think most places ask for a final “official†transcript, right? So they’ll definitely see that she had a light semester :(

 

The one exception is if we offered a provisional admission. If your ds's acceptance is provisional or contingent upon completing a particular class, you'd know it. It would have been clearly stated in the letter of  admission. It's HIGHLY unlikely that a 4.0/1390 student was given any provisions :)

 

The one caveat I'll add is that sometimes an offer of admission, while not strictly provisional, is still based on the assumption that the student will successfully complete a particular course (usually math) they are currently enrolled in. If they don't, we might not catch it when they mail the transcript in, but it would likely affect their performance on the math placement exam they have to take before enrolling. At a high-tuition school like this, you don't want to make the mistake of having to take a prerequisite math course that doesn't count towards degree requirements and could delay graduation by a semester. I don't know what the typical math sequence for nursing majors is, but that is something I'd recommend checking on before dropping/easing math. Same with science. Many university level courses will be based on the assumption that you are already familiar with basic bio/chem/phys concepts from high school. 

[HappyGrace]

Thanks so much-this was so helpful! The only courses I had on the transcript for spring were things we thought she’d be continuing. We’ve since changed it to be a credit and a half less-she’s not finishing the Pre-Calc she started (half credit) because she’s well beyond the high school math she needed, and the Pre-Calc was mostly trig and doesn’t seem like anything she’ll need for nursing. She will need to take ONE math elective for nursing, but it’s basically a first year Algebra course. That seems more helpful for nursing than the Pre-Calc was! It would probably be easy for her, I would think. The other credit she wont’ be taking is a 200 level Lit class that was the only other English elective she needs for her nursing degree. She’d have time to take it there, so why stress now about it.

 

Also she already took Bio/Chem/Physics, and this year is taking a full-year online pre-Anatomy and Physiology course, to help her the first year with A+P, which we heard is a weed-out course. She’s enjoying it and doing well.

 

So good to know about the provisions. I didn’t read anything about that in the acceptances, but I’ll double check with her.

 

Also, she finished some of her first year courses online-English 101 and 102, etc., so that would free her up to take a pre-req math or something in college if she absolutely had to.

 

I didn’t know about these things you’ve mentioned on here-it’s really a huge help and I appreciate it! Please let me know if there is anything else I might be missing!!!!

 

I’m leaning toward having the light semester for spring, but that would leave her with only finishing the science course (1 credit), a Medical Terminology course (.5 credit), and Phys Ed. It just seems so light!

 

She will be working more, plus she does a puppet ministry at church she wants to spend time on, and works with the middle school girls group at church-just some things like that she would like to give time to, plus her own healing. ANNNND she hasn’t learned to drive yet due to time constraints and we need to get that going in the next couple months!

 

I’m 100% for easing up, but I just don’t want to regret it after because the colleges are upset at the light semester!

[katilac]

That would be a little too light for my tastes. I'd also not want to take a complete break from math for the 8-9 months before she starts college. 

 

I would probably have her do either a math course or simply some math review with no credit, and I'd add at least one more course, If she's finishing the science class, then she will only have .5 for that in spring, and .5 for the medical terms course. I'd want to add another .5 academic course, for sure. That would still put her at just 1.5 academic credits for spring, 2 credits total with PE. That's still a very light semester, even with some math review.