So, why exactly can I choose the class without parental supervision, but not choose to drop it so easily?

I’m not a horrible kid. I do my homework (most of the time), and I get decent enough grades (3.2 GPA). I don’t have house parties when my parents are out of town. In school, I haven’t had a detention since the sixth grade, and that was for tardies. I’m in NHS. I don’t get kicked out of class constantly. I’m right in the middle of the teacher-student relationship spectrum – I’m not a pet, but I’m not anti-social, either. I have a boyfriend, and I try to keep the PDA down to a minimum. I don’t disrupt, and I don’t cause fights. I’m actually pretty darn good, if I say so myself.

My one downfall was math, but it was a subject considered by my mother to be important. To please her, I took the most difficult math classes I could, but never managed above a C in them. Finally, last year, I decided on taking PreCalc. My mistake. I didn’t understand the class at ALL. I’d attempt the work, but end up with a headache after three hours and two problems. I had a free hour, which was usually dedicated to completing any homework I had in PreCalc. My teacher said I wasn’t trying hard enough and that I should have came in for help, but I don’t have a car/license, and my parents both work relatively late hours (400 and 600, which, when school gets out at 220, and teachers are OUT by 300, is a long while to wait), and needed to be told at least a week in advance that I needed to be picked up. I’d offer to come in on my free hour, but she’d refuse me, telling me that she needed to be there for that hour (semi-ironic, because I remember last year, when she would help her PreCalc during our hour, but maybe I’m just crazy). I was unmistakably behind in the workload – it’s not a good thing when things that should have been comprehended last year were just falling into place last semester.

I was in over my head.

I brought up the possibility of dropping to my mother. Once she saw that I made an effort and still didn’t get it, she gave me permission to drop.

But the drop process was more difficult than I expected. First, I wasn’t allowed to get the form to drop until this January. When I got the paper, I was informed that the teacher had to fill out a good portion of it. After I gave it to my mom to fill out (the first three or four lines, including “Name” “Student Name” “Grade” and “Reason for Dropping”, and gave it to my teacher (Who had a good portion, including “Does this student attempt the homework?” to which she replied “Sometimes” {I was furious after that}, and “Has this student ever asked for help?” to which she said “Never” {Bull. I just couldn’t come in after school, and she wouldn’t be able to help me during school}), I turned it into the counseling office. Apparently, because I had turned it into my counselor, it was considered “finished”, and it went to the principal for decision. She sent it back because no parent-counselor-teacher meeting was held.

This is where I get very, very upset. Last year, it was my choice as to what classes I wanted to take. I signed up for them. My parents had no notification of my choices. They found out what I wanted when they read my schedule. At that point, my will was good enough for the school, because it was convenient. They didn’t have to get tons of copies of “Do you want your child to take this class or this class and not this class?” printed and sent out. I was mature enough then, why not ‘now’, when I’ve decided, “hey, this class is too difficult, I want out”?

But, my parents are my legal guardians. They, by law, are responsible and even REQUIRED to make certain choices regarding my well being. Okay, I can deal with that – I kind of have to. Guess what? They wanted me out of the class, too.

I fail to see where the teacher comes into play. A lot of teachers take it as a personal attack when a student wants to drop. They seem to think that the student sees them as a bad person, or that it’s a blow to their teaching skills. Few of them, in my experience, realize that the student may actually have a problem in the class – no, it’s all about their pathetic little egos. I fail to see where my counselor had the right to make a decision. She told me flat-out that she tends to agree with the teachers in regards to dropping a class, because the teachers know best. As I said before, sometimes the teachers are biased. They were included, I feel, because my dropping a class was an “inconvenience”. Heaven forbid that a current student of theirs take a spot that an incoming transfer could have!

Personally, I think the decision process should have been this: Student requests the paper, parent fills it out, there is a parent-student-principal meeting. My mother and I never sat down with my principal – she was shown my grades in the class and expected to make a decision based on the teacher’s comments. Thankfully, my mother emailed the principal, and explained her point of view.

As for the outcome? I was dropped from the class. The counselor decided to set up the meeting (which my mother insisted I be present for), both the counselor and teacher basically told me that it was my fault for not getting an A+ in the class and that, in the real world, I’m a slacker. I wasn’t trying to drop out of everything. I wanted to drop out of a class I was struggling and unable to receive help in. Luckily, the principal saw my side of the story and let me out.

My mother and I have both been told that the school is absolutely insane – my mother wanted me out of the class, so I should have been dropped or, at most, had to speak with the principal about the situation. According to them, neither of us should have been made to jump through the hoops we had to.

But my school doesn’t like to let the students make choices that aren’t right in line with what they want. That bothers me – why are they constantly telling us that out in the real world, we have to make our own choices and be responsible for them, when they won’t allow me, or even my parents, to pull me out of a class that not one of us want me in, without calling out the Calvary to criticize my “lack of ethics” and my parent’s teaching skills (“Are you really setting a good example for her by letting her drop a class that she’s doing poorly in, when she won’t even try?” “Um, I do try.” “Not according to your work.” “Well, I’ve tried getting help, but you won’t even try to accommodate me.”). Why am I capable of being charged as an adult in regards to a crime, or enlisting in the military, but not allowed to stay out past midnight? Why is it that I’m only adult enough to make my own decisions a quarter of the time, but yet a man twenty years my senior is almost always allowed to make his own choices, even though there’s a possibility that he’s a pedophile or murderer (not that all thirty-seven year-old-men are, I’m just hypothetically speaking) and that his actions could harm more than mine? It just bothers me that I’m supposed to be accountable for my own actions because I’m almost 18, but there’s so much held back from me because I haven’t had that birthday yet.

Please, society, just make up your mind: Do I have a choice, or not?