Public school will not enroll my son

[katilac]

100% normal.   It is also *extremely* difficult for a High School student to move from one state to another state and not need to take a lot of tests or repeat courses.  

 

I haven't actually found this to be the case - as long as the student was in an "official" school, credits tend to transfer with little issue. Homeschooling credits, not so much. 

[Artichoke]

Locally, we have the same problem with public schools, but one family was able to enroll a child as a senior at the private (Catholic) school.

She did not get credit for homeschool classes & the school did not give her a diploma (which was fine, she just wanted the school experience) but they did let her take all senior year classes & play sports.

 

 

Some of our local Christian schools will let homeschool students play sports for only the cost  of the sport.  This pretty much only happens at the  smaller schools who need the players. 

Edited September 5, 2017 by Artichoke

[creekland]

It is also *extremely* difficult for a High School student to move from one state to another state and not need to take a lot of tests or repeat courses.  

 

This is not at all true in my district as long as they came from a ps or accredited private school.  Credits from other states transfer.  If in the middle of the school year, current grades transfer, then get averaged in with the grades in the continued course at our school.  If the content isn't the same, the teacher makes it work out however they can, but not having it work out is not an option.

[bettyandbob]

I haven't actually found this to be the case - as long as the student was in an "official" school, credits tend to transfer with little issue. Homeschooling credits, not so much. 

 

 

The credits from private school or public school in another state may transfer. However the student may have to take a bunch of end of course exams. My state has a end of course exams in several subjects. Graduation requires course credits plus and certain number of passed end of course exams. 

[...................]

This is very standard and I'm surprised you had no idea this would be an issue.  To most public schools, unless the work was from an accredited institution in YOUR state, it's worthless.  It's stupid but it's common.  

 

I would look at parochial schools - private schools would be more than willing to have a well adjusted, hard working young man who has already achieved so much.  As long as you have a REALLY strong paper trail with all your tests, lab reports, quizzes, writing samples and test scores they should be willing to work with you.

[Laurel-in-CA]

Charter schools that support homeschoolers are sometimes more accepting, but not always and, of course, most do not have the sports component.

[MinivanMom]

I haven't actually found this to be the case - as long as the student was in an "official" school, credits tend to transfer with little issue. Homeschooling credits, not so much. 

 

Our district not only requires new move-ins from out-of-state to repeat our state's end-of-course exams, but they also require them to take foreign language placement tests.

 

A friend of mine moved here from Virginia (DC suburbs), and our local public high school wouldn't just accept her son's French 1 & French 2 credits (with A's) from their accredited Virginia public school. Her son had to take a French placement test. He just missed placing into French 3 (either by a single question or a single percentage point - I can't remember now), so they only let him keep the credit from French 1 and made him repeat French 2. My friend was hopping mad, but there wasn't anything she could do. 

 

So transferring from an accredited out-of-state public school is easier than trying to come in from an unaccredited private school or from homeschooling, but it can still cause problems. 

[MinivanMom]

The crazy thing is, a homeschooler from out of district enrolled her daughter as a junior.  The only problem they faced was when she wanted to be in Spanish 4 and the school wanted her in Spanish 3 because she "only" had Spanish 1 and 2 at a co-op in town.  She took Spanish 4 and aced it. This was 4 years ago.  Another student was required to take test outs to get freshman credit (he entered as a sophomore).  He never tested out of English 9 but they gave him credit for it since he passed English 10 with flying colors. Inconsistencies abound.

 

Our district is kinder to homeschoolers than most. Yes, homeschoolers will have to take the relevant end-of-course exams and placement exams for any foreign languages, but there is a written policy stating that principals may evaluate any schoolwork and grant credits for whatever they deem acceptable. 

 

I hear a lot of people locally who complain about inconsistencies, and there certainly appear to be a lot of inconsistencies, but I've found that most of them can be explained by test scores (or the lack thereof). If your kid can ace the EOC's and the FL placement test and has great SAT or ACT scores, then you probably won't have any problems getting enrolled unless you run into a particularly difficult principal. But if your kid doesn't shine in high-stakes testing or hasn't taken any tests, then the school is going to want them starting over as a freshman in all basic classes. And some principals don't want to accept any homeschoolers beyond 9th grade as a matter of principle.

 

So even here, it's still risky to start high school at home thinking you can just make a switch later on. If you luck out with a cooperative principal . . . maybe. But I wouldn't be planning on it.

[Kassia]

We are thinking of enrolling dd into ps for her junior and senior years to get free DE.  So far I have spoken to a high school guidance counselor and it appears that they will accept her credits, but I won't know for sure until we actually try to enroll dd.  Dd has taken the SAT and one SAT subject test and scored well, plus she has taken several DE courses so she does have test scores and DE grades to back up some homeschool grades/credits.  I'm hoping it goes smoothly, but we'll see.  

[Sebastian (a lady)]

I haven't actually found this to be the case - as long as the student was in an "official" school, credits tend to transfer with little issue. Homeschooling credits, not so much.

We are military with friends who often have to move high schoolers. I wouldn't call it extremely difficult, but there can be a lot of snags.

 

Oddly it seems to be things like state history, PE, and health that create issues. Core courses seem to transfer ok.

 

Our friends do run into placement issues, especially when one school is AP heavy and the other is not. I think there are also issues when one state has traditional math courses and the other is integrated.

[Ellie]

We are military with friends who often have to move high schoolers. I wouldn't call it extremely difficult, but there can be a lot of snags.

 

Oddly it seems to be things like state history, PE, and health that create issues. Core courses seem to transfer ok.

 

Our friends do run into placement issues, especially when one school is AP heavy and the other is not. I think there are also issues when one state has traditional math courses and the other is integrated.

 

I started high school at 10th grade, because that was how it was done in Virginia back in the day. (Junior high was seven through nine.) In Virginia, health and PE were alternated, so about one semester of each, only one year. We moved to South Carolina a little half way through my sophomore year. I dropped PE/health because SC didn't require it. Started my junior year there in the fall, with world history, no PE, finished the semester at Christmas, moved to California. where there were still two more weeks of the first semester (had to take semester exams for classes I had only been in for two weeks. :huh: ). Dropped world history, which was not required in California, added PE, which was (all three or four years of high school, so more PE than history or science, but that's another discussion, lol)...but had some problems because Cali required a whole year of health, and I had only had a semester. :huh: But they decided to let it go. Moved back to Virginia for my senior year, and it was all good. Whew!

[Grantmom]

I'm sorry, OP!  I knew about this only because I had a friend whose son wanted to enter PS in 10th grade, and they made him start at 9th.  It didn't turn out to be a big deal for him because he was young for his grade anyway, so in the end it worked out.  

 

Maybe you can look into private schools or even a junior college for a year?  Here we have junior colleges that are sort of like community colleges that offer two-year degrees, but they have sports teams.  Some of them are actually really good, competitive teams, too.  Or look for local community sports.  We have all kinds of sports here that aren't affiliated with schools, everything from rec level to more competitive than the high school leagues.

 

Good luck!

Edited September 6, 2017 by Grantmom

[plansrme]

Not sure if the OP is still following this thread, as she's been kind of quiet, but just in case it's helpful, I would recommend checking the local school district's policies yourself.  I was told by both a GC and an assistant principal that my daughter's homeschooled classes from middle school would not be accepted for credit in high school.  The GC insisted she'd checked with "the county" and been told that.  I checked the county's actual regulations, though, and found that there was a procedure for the schools to recognize homeschool classes by examination.  My daughter had 5s on the corresponding AP exams, so I wrote a letter to everyone, citing their own regulation and suggesting that the AP exams be recognized as appropriate exams.  They agreed and granted her credit for a bunch of classes required for graduation.  The point of my little tale is to check the appropriate policies yourself; your local principal or whomever may not actually know the rules.

 

That is a separate issue from whether the school will take HS classes into account for placement purposes.  We had zero problems with this; the school took my word for it and put her where I said she should be.

[J-rap]

I wonder if it is trending to not allow homeschoolers to participate, or if schools are becoming more open to the idea.  

 

For example, in our district, 35 years ago there were barely any homeschoolers around.  When the first generation of homeschoolers attempted to take a class or two or even transfer to the public high school, the district didn't know what to do and in the end, made it very difficult.  By the time our kids got to that age, the schools here were much more open to the idea, and had more of a "We're all in this together" attitude.  Our kids were able to take one or all of their classes at the public high school, at any point.  They could begin taking two classes there in 10th grade, none there in 11th grade, and six classes there as a senior.  They could participate in sports and extra-curricular activities whether or not they were taking classes there.  The principal was very welcoming, and coaches even reached out to homeschoolers to get them on their athletic teams.  

 

This is not necessarily standard practice among districts in our state, but I believe our state does require public schools to allow homeschoolers in at any point (though in some -- maybe even most? -- districts it has to be full time).  But, districts can decide to make it difficult.  For example, they can require a homeschooler transferring to their school in 11th grade to take and pass an exam for every subject before accepting their credits.

 

Our kids also had the option of graduating with the local high school, even if they never went there full time.  Any courses they took at home would show up on the school's transcript as "transferred" courses, but they were never questioned.  The same would be true for students transferring in from a private school.

 

In talking to the principal and various board members here, they feel it's a good, even exchange to handle it the way they do.  We homeschoolers of course benefit from taking courses there and being on their sports teams and arts clubs.  But the schools feel it's to their advantage too -- they've only had good experiences with homeschoolers;  they tend to be hard workers, dedicated participants on teams and clubs, and generally bring a good morale to the public school environment.

[....]

I wonder if it is trending to not allow homeschoolers to participate, or if schools are becoming more open to the idea.  

 

They're pretty belligerent to homeschoolers here (we're in TX).  I don't think the school districts here will ever allow homeschoolers to do sports, take classes, etc.  There's no trend in that direction.  

 

And I say "belligerent", because we watched the elementary school here call CPS on my homeschooling neighbor multiple times when she tried to enroll her kid in the school.  (I don't want to post too much info about it, but they were just flat-out being jerks. CPS even told them to cut it out.)

 

For sports - try sports clubs (some of my kids are in a track & field club)...we have homeschool sports leagues/teams (I know some places don't have those)...for martial arts, gymnastics, stuff like that - you don't need to go to school to participate in those.  A lot of the sports leagues here are not school-based (basketball, baseball, etc).

[....]

 By the time our kids got to that age, the schools here were much more open to the idea, and had more of a "We're all in this together" attitude.  Our kids were able to take one or all of their classes at the public high school, at any point.  They could begin taking two classes there in 10th grade, none there in 11th grade, and six classes there as a senior.  They could participate in sports and extra-curricular activities whether or not they were taking classes there.  The principal was very welcoming, and coaches even reached out to homeschoolers to get them on their athletic teams.  

 

Boy, that would be wonderful!  I wish it were like that where we live.  

[snowbeltmom]

In some cases the school might be fine with permitting a homeschooler to play on the school's sport team, but the state athletic association is the entity that prevents the homeschooler from participating.  

 

A few years ago, the Ohio High School Athletic Association hired lobbyists to fight the current law that permits homeschoolers in Ohio to participate on public sports teams. Thankfully the OHSAA and its lobbyists lost.