A-g

[happycc]

Here in California one of the main ways to get into a UC or State school is going through the A-g program through a public independent study charter school. 

That is the route we took as it seemed the easiest with other kids I needed to care for as well. 

As we continue with this A-g route without charter school, I am finding it limiting. 

Freshman year my twins took Moodle classes through their charter school and a BYU foreign language class and honestly they were not challenged. 

Sophomore year they took three junior college courses, three AOPS courses and and an APEX English and finally a little more challenged. However AOPS is no longer considered A-G. And they didn't like APEX. They prefer face to face online classes rather than read something and bubble in the answer all the time which is essentially what APEX is about. 

My question:  This year they are going to try out UC SCOUT for a course and is that like APEX? Has anyone tried NUVHS? 

I continue with this misery because one of my twins want to go to UC berkeley and the other Stanford or some UC school down south. 

[Sebastian (a lady)]

Stanford is a private school with world wide applications.  It doesn't require A-G coursework.  It does look for challenging courses and interesting students.  

We are out of state, but my son was accepted to UCSD without having paid attention to A-G. (I realize UCSD isn't as competitive as Berkeley. I think the A-G process is the same across the system.) He had several AP courses and exams, 6 subject tests and several college courses  (math, chemistry,  and foreign language).  He was probably accepted there under the admission by examination process, though he didn't have to ask for that consideration.

My thought was to have them take the most challenging courses they are ready for and interested in. Apply to Berkeley and Stanford,  but realize the odds are long at either.  My middle son applied to over a dozen schools. It was hard for us to gauge how competitive his application was to an outside reader.  He had a pleasant collection of acceptances that included merit aid at many schools.  

[Sebastian (a lady)]

I should add that we are out of state in California and for every other school my older kids applied to.  The local state uni system didnt have strong departments that interest my kids.  That definitely influenced their willingness to look far and wide for college matches.  I realize for a California resident it could feel differently. 

[Laurel-in-CA]

The easiest (but least scholarship) route to a UC is to do an AA/complete general ed at a community college and transfer. Little scholarship money, but big potential savings on tuition. And private schools in CA do not require A-G. You probably already knew that. Often community colleges have online classes; you might look into dual enrolling that way and get both A-G credit and meeting general ed requirements.

 

[domesticidyll]

CA only asks for a-g requirements from its in-state students, so out of state admissions are more flexible (still impressive achievement to get into UCSD, though!). 

We just pulled DS14 from his charter for this reason. To my surprise! I was really hoping to stick with the charter all the way through.

In our case, I was willing to have DS test out of the a-g requirements (he was lucky enough to have AoPS geometry while it still counted), but the charter couldn't/wouldn't give appropriate credit for his courses. No credit for AoPS work done in summer, no honors credit for AoPS or Lukeion, no honors or even a-g credit for mom English classes. I was hesitant to have DS's official transcript not reflect the actual challenge and depth of his classes. And for schools that rely largely on weighted GPA, like Cal Poly, I was concerned that not having an appropriately weighted GPA would be very hard on admissions chances. I think he'll end up testing for most if not all a-g requirements, but we'll revisit that choice if it gets in the way of Why We Homeschool. (At the moment, it doesn't look too forbidding.)

If the charter stipend is essential, I'd look into ways to keep up challenge while fulfilling what is needed. Local community college courses for math and science? The other advantage of dual enrollment, whether you end up applying as a freshman or transfer, is that the weighted GPA gets a boost. OR take the class of your choice with UC approved test? If you plan to test out, you don't actually need the charter to give you a-g credit--you can just take something that will satisfy the charter's high school graduation requirement, which is different from their a-g requirement and is generally much, much less difficult to get approved. This seems obvious, but I mention it because sometimes guidance counselors don't even consider not doing every single class as a-g. They tend to see a-g as synonymous with college prep, which of course it isn't, quite.

(There's also the option of just submitting what you did, with syllabi and course descriptions, and tests for some subjects, and trusting that UC will see that it is a-g quality. Other posters on this board seem to have had quite a bit of success with that method. I think it is possibly easier to do this as an independent private school than as a charter school attendee, but I am not sure.)

Lots of work-arounds, all of which are potentially better than watering down what you do to get a-g through the charter!

[domesticidyll]

1 hour ago, Sebastian (a lady) said:

My thought was to have them take the most challenging courses they are ready for and interested in.

 Just to add, this is exactly our plan! Thanks for putting it so well ?

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

I feel your pain....

I would encourage you to read the threads already on this topic, search for A-G and California and UC 

I think that UC Scout is not approved unless you're under a charter. Now that you are without a charter you will find that finding A-G courses is even more impossible.  As per the UC directly emailing me and many others, here's how it works.  If the A-G approved course is from an institution that can issue you an official transcript, then it qualifies.  If not you can only use it under your charter who will issue the official transcript.  IN other words, they want to know you took the course under a school type institution, not an online class institution.  I don't know how they make that distinction and it seems very stupid to me, but there it is.  I am almost positive UC Scout does not qualify.

Now that said, I believe it is Arcadia? who has had great success just not worrying about whether a course is UC approved.  She has sent her son to Berkeley at like age 11 and runs an online facebook group.  What they have found, is that the new applications allow you to enter the coursework and then in the comments you can list more info about where you took it.  The UC's are more holistic than ever.  An impressive resume with soem dual enrollment, some online, and very high SAT scores will make up for the issue, according to her experience.

I personally found that approach scary (I didn't want to get to the other end and find they suddenly changed or started checking on things more) so my kids will be going to CC early and then transferring.  One at 17.5 and one probably at 18.  They will get freshman housing once they transfer so they will make friends of the same age and have a similar experience.  ONe of them has a very hard major and the other one will take one or two minors so each of them will most likely end up at the UC for three years following their transfer.  SO, we save 70,000 on each child and they still have a very full college experience.  So far my son has not felt pressured AT ALL and he is a rock star at our (highly rated) community college.  He loves it!! 

My dd starts in the fall and we will see how that goes ?

There's a lot to process in those threads so definitely if you find them set some time aside.  

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

1 hour ago, Laurel-in-CA said:

The easiest (but least scholarship) route to a UC is to do an AA/complete general ed at a community college and transfer. Little scholarship money, but big potential savings on tuition. And private schools in CA do not require A-G. You probably already knew that. Often community colleges have online classes; you might look into dual enrolling that way and get both A-G credit and meeting general ed requirements.

 

Absolutely...it has been very very seamless, very affordable, fun for my son!  No pressure.  He took the SAT for fun, and far exceeded our expectations. I wonder if the lack of pressure has something to do with his success?! ?

Also, be aware for STEM majors they don't even need to complete the full General Ed Pattern (called IGETC)...they only need to complete what their target UC wants, and for that you call the UC and speak to someone from their department.  We thought my son would have to spend three years at CC but it turned out only to be two because he doesn't need COmmunications, or foreign language, or PE or a whole host of other classes ? 

[Arcadia]

2 hours ago, Calming Tea said:

Now that said, I believe it is Arcadia? who has had great success just not worrying about whether a course is UC approved.  She has sent her son to Berkeley at like age 11 and runs an online facebook group.

 

Quark’s son is in UCB ?

My kids aren’t interested in UC or CSU but DS13 would likely have enough AP and SAT test scores to satisfy the A-G requirements at the end of 11th grade. He is not interested in going to college early. 

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

Ah yes, Quark...sorry Arcadia...

 

where do your sons want to go, if they've ruled out 70% of all the U's in California there must be an interesting reason... ?

[quark]

Happy CC, are you saying that you are not with a charter school? If you are not and you are filing your own PSA, you do not need to worry about taking A-G approved classes. UC will assess your students' applications primarily by exam while UC Berkeley and UCLA and possibly a couple others will assess them via holistic factors as well.

[quark]

On 7/4/2018 at 3:22 PM, Calming Tea said:

Now that said, I believe it is Arcadia? who has had great success just not worrying about whether a course is UC approved.  She has sent her son to Berkeley at like age 11 and runs an online facebook group.  What they have found, is that the new applications allow you to enter the coursework and then in the comments you can list more info about where you took it.  The UC's are more holistic than ever.  An impressive resume with soem dual enrollment, some online, and very high SAT scores will make up for the issue, according to her experience.?

There's a lot to process in those threads so definitely if you find them set some time aside.  

 

Berkeley at 14 (with concurrent enrollment at 13). Community college at 11. ?

[Crimson Wife]

If you are PSA, then I would not worry about finding a-g approved courses.

The issue I'm running into with the charter that my DS is enrolled in is that they don't want to allow him to use AOPS for Algebra 1 since it's no longer a-g approved. Even though my DS will be in 7th and he could very well have his lower-level courses validated by enrolling in an a-g approved Algebra 2 in 9th (if we decided to stay with the charter for high school).