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Stanford online high school - any experience?


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https://ohs.stanford.edu

 

An ad popped up on my Facebook so I checked the website quickly. I don't think I've seen it mentioned here, I'm wondering if anyone has looked into this.

 

 

 

(We are having a trying week with tween attitude plus gifted sensitivity, so I'm especially interested today! Lol)

Edited by someonestolemyname
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I know daijobu's (did I spell that correctly?) student is taking a course. IRL I know a couple of people who are enrolled full-time. If I had the money, sure I would enroll Dd, but I'm not sure which course. Every year I take a look. It's like looking at the specs of a 2017 car but knowing I'll just stick with our 2003 car for now.

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If you can stomach the application and financial aid process, it seems an excellent program according to families I know doing it part time with a mix and match of other classes e.g. AoPS, PAH etc. It was always way beyond our reach because I don't think we qualify for aid and DS likes f2f discussions with profs over online. I heard that despite being online there is a lot of interaction between classmates (for the social side of things).

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Not me personally, but I have a friend whose kid took a couple classes there last year.

 

She found the whole application process to be... overly thorough?  Transcripts, test scores, interviews...

 

She didn't end up being very impressed with the classes.  Yes, they were advanced.  Seems like they make so sure all the kids are super-smart, they just give them a lot of advanced material but don't do a lot of teaching.  The English class didn't have much writing, and what writing there was wasn't taught, just expected.  The Spanish class was about a year ahead (I think the Spanish 2 class uses a Spanish 3 text), and had lots of discussion and writing, but there was zero grammar instruction, the kids were just supposed to teach it themselves from the book or online lessons - but it was tested.

 

Anyway, friend didn't have her kid take any more classes from them this year.  For the $$$$$$ she thought there should be more instruction.  

 

The kids are all advanced; they won't let you in otherwise.  There is a good amount of class time/discussion - I think the classes meet 2x/week for 1.5 hrs?  But so do many of the other online schools.  It is very expensive.

 

I think she also said they have a very particular sequence of which courses you take when, especially if you go full-time.  Even part-time, they kept trying to discourage her kid from taking Spanish 2 as a 9th grader, even though kid was more than well prepared enough for it (yes, even though it was really Spanish 3).  Kid had no problem with the class and made an A.  If you're going to advertise and select for advanced kids, don't act all shocked when they end up being... advanced.  Yeesh.

 

She has a friend who has two dds who have gone through it full-time (one done, one currently in it) who thinks it's all that.  I think the older dd of her friend is now at an Ivy.  

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Dd is taking AP bio at SOHS and it's been a huge win for us.  She loves the course and is learning a lot and doing very well.  But the quality of the classes is uneven, and I do not recommend going full time because there is just so much work, the FT students seem to need to work all. the. time. just to stay caught up.  Like if they take a day or two off for Thanksgiving, they are swamped and needing to choose which assignments just won't get done.  I don't really believe in that kind of work at the high school level.  

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Wouldn't one be better off paying out of pocket for college classes at that price point? And calling it high school? Is it more rigorous than your run-of-the-mill 4-year-college class? Just wondering out loud.

My biggest issue with high school, as with all of homeschool, is socialization. Now that I would pay $ for someone to solve.

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Wouldn't one be better off paying out of pocket for college classes at that price point? And calling it high school? Is it more rigorous than your run-of-the-mill 4-year-college class? Just wondering out loud.

 

I'm not sure if it's more rigorous than other 4-year schools but when we were desperate for further challenge, we paid an equivalent price for one course at our flagship uni (Stanford's rival ha ha!) and DS loved the experience. It was an in person class with an assistant prof and a great grad student TA for discussions (TA was SO good and DS liked the TA better than the prof!). The flagship's concurrent enrollment program registration was easy peasy vs OHS. If we could have afforded it, he would be taking more classes at the uni but it would be equivalent to OHS in price and we can't do that. But yes, we felt we were better off paying that much money at an in person college class and he will very likely receive college credit for it (the cons is that this concurrent enrollment program does not outright promise college credit but most people who take it report that it does when they enter as freshmen).

 

No experience with OHS personally though so I don't know if it is a fair comparison. It is after all Stanford's brand name (but for high school) and I am guessing most people are paying for that. In our experience, taking classes on a college campus have been very good for a number of reasons.

 

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She didn't end up being very impressed with the classes.  Yes, they were advanced.  Seems like they make so sure all the kids are super-smart, they just give them a lot of advanced material but don't do a lot of teaching.  The English class didn't have much writing, and what writing there was wasn't taught, just expected.  The Spanish class was about a year ahead (I think the Spanish 2 class uses a Spanish 3 text), and had lots of discussion and writing, but there was zero grammar instruction, the kids were just supposed to teach it themselves from the book or online lessons - but it was tested.

 

Like if they take a day or two off for Thanksgiving, they are swamped and needing to choose which assignments just won't get done.  I don't really believe in that kind of work at the high school level.  

 

Wow, thank you both for sharing this. I only hear positive things on the elists I'm on. IIRC no one has shared anything negative about OHS at all. Good to know!

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I'm not sure if it's more rigorous than other 4-year schools but when we were desperate for further challenge, we paid an equivalent price for one course at our flagship uni (Stanford's rival ha ha!) and DS loved the experience. It was an in person class with an assistant prof and a great grad student TA for discussions (TA was SO good and DS liked the TA better than the prof!). The flagship's concurrent enrollment program registration was easy peasy vs OHS. If we could have afforded it, he would be taking more classes at the uni but it would be equivalent to OHS in price and we can't do that. But yes, we felt we were better off paying that much money at an in person college class and he will very likely receive college credit for it (the cons is that this concurrent enrollment program does not outright promise college credit but most people who take it report that it does when they enter as freshmen).

 

No experience with OHS personally though so I don't know if it is a fair comparison. It is after all Stanford's brand name (but for high school) and I am guessing most people are paying for that. In our experience, taking classes on a college campus have been very good for a number of reasons.

 

 

That's kind of what led me to look at the CC. The fact is, we're in a cheap state-a year of full time CC tuition, full pay, no discounts, is less than one COURSE at OHS.  Even For high school, it seems worth it to at least try the CC first and see if it is a good fit. And the stuff DD needs most just isn't really amenable to online learning. I just can't quite fathom how you'd do an online microbiology lab, for example.

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We had looked at it but the lack of social interactions and having a price tag that has gone up $4k over the years, it has become more expensive than some B&M private schools locally.

 

My oldest went for Stanford Splash last week and love the social aspects from 10am to 5pm. He is a very social introvert. So we are looking at B&M for high school.

 

I only hear positive things on the elists I'm on. IIRC no one has shared anything negative about OHS at all.

I have heard negatives from parents mainly about social needs. These parents are in cutthroat school districts so academics might seem equally hectic or easy.

 

The thing is B&M public school kids have many afterschool clubs at high school level. PE and volunteer work is kind of taken care of. It is kind of weird to be still arranging "play dates" and extracurriculars for their kids in high school. I hear similar complaints about Basis Independent. A mom said her child is busy with outside school competitions so her social needs are always met outside of school since kindergarten.

Edited by Arcadia
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