accommodations - high school credit

Post Reply New Topic

If the teachers reduces the homework assignments - doing fewer problems or subbing a shorter assignment for a project - can the child get normal full high school credit?

I'm asking because we homeschool and we want to reduce assignments for ASD kids. My child is still a middle-schooler, but the parents of high schoolers are asking.

I honestly don't know, but the standard in high school I have seen has been to reduce course load and add supports, plus allowed increased time on tests, but not reduce individual assignments. So my guess is that no, you can't get equal credit without equal work.

My personal feeling is that in high school you are starting to transition the child to real life, and real life doesn't reduce work loads. So, it becomes how to handle what has to be done, instead of changing what has to be done. My son (a senior in high school who has been off IEP for a while but still has a 504) is going to drop an AP class he would love content wise simply because this year's school work load is too high for his ability to manage a work load. That is the kind of real life decision he may have to make continually through out his life, and this is when he practices making those decisions wisely. It breaks my heart in a lot of ways, but no one can do what they can't do and we all have limitations; the trick is understanding them and figuring out how to live with them.

In Canada, those changes would probably be considered an accomodation rather than a modification; it would depend on how much the workload was reduced.
This is pretty detailed, but it explains the difference quite well.
https://specialeducationontario.wikispa ... +Oxley.pdf
The other thing to consider is that even if a course is modified here, the student still gets credit for it. It is indicated on his or her transcript that the course has been modified (just as it indicates if it is an advanced course etc.).
I have found high school is very flexible. It's much easier when a student fails an individual subject rather than a whole year and can repeat it in an alternate format (if it's compulsory) or can just let it go and get other credits instead.
J.

The underlying determination when I was a teacher seemed to be whether the child was learning the same objectives at the same level.

Your state should have an objective list for every high school course. The way it is taught and the number of problems or amount of work done should have no determination.

The previous poster made a good point about differing accommodations (which do not affect diplomas) and modifications (which do affect diplomas).