Our teens love to surprise us with their latest brilliant idea and my 16-year-old didn’t disappoint the other day. Almost literally waiting at the door for my return home, he accosted me with the urgency only a hormonal teen can bring. “Dad, I hate high school and want to drop out and do independent study,” he declares.
I think I would’ve preferred, “Hey Dad, whas up?”
We sat down and he began his pitch. The fact that all this followed a recent social disaster at school he quickly dismissed as irrelevant. His rationale was that he is totally bored in high school, his teachers are boring, none of what he’s learning interests him, and he’d rather go back to home-schooling or “independent study,” as they call it at his high school.
Hmmm, I think he may be the only teen in history who thinks high school is a waste of time and that his teachers are boring and what he’s learning is irrelevant. After all, he’s a rock ‘n’ roller, so what’s the point? I calmed him down and suggested he discuss it with his counselor. Find out what would be involved. It’s true that he did well when I home-schooled him, during 18 months of middle school, and he attended a local community college, at 13, getting an “A” and a “B” in his two courses there.
But, making such a rash decision did not seem well thought out and while I didn’t dismiss it out-of-hand, I said such a big decision wasn’t going to be made in a hurry. He has pretty much hated all of high school, with the exception of having a vibrant social life and a great girlfriend. However, that social life was set awry by a foolish facebook post and it hasn’t gotten back on trackr yet. Could there be a connection?
So, the next day he visited his counselor. She explained all that would be involved and it wasn’t easy or simple. With all the passion that met me at the front door, the day before, he casually said, “let’s forget it,” and that was the end of that. Another lesson in raising a teen – don’t over-react to their over-reactions, but what do I know: I’m just a guy.
