I am working on the course summary and transcript and would appreciate any advice from fellow homeschoolers. From what I read, I need to list the courses, descriptions, books used, length, grades, and grade scale. Not sure if I'm missing anything. DS has over 30 dual credit hours so far, so a lot of his course descriptions I am rewriting from the syllabi. Is this ok? I know this is important and I don't want to make any mistakes. I'm trying to get this all done now, so it's finished when the next step of his portal opens up. Also, how much do you weight the dual credit courses on your child's transcript? We will also include the college transcript, but I need to include them on the high school transcript as well. Any advice is much appreciated. Thanks in advance!
Homeschool course summary and transcript advice
- Thread starter Texark147
- Start date
Thanks. That is something that he needs to do soon. I believe he has their names and contact info.
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It is on the webpages. I hope that a home school parent chimes in to answer your questions...I know several who are lurkers here...but don't generally post....Also, it is not a rush/rush...the deadline for the Class of 2028 is the end of January 2024...however, I know you want to be prepared to submit in July when the portal fully opens and also to your Senators and Congressman for the nomination applications.
Yes, he would like to turn his best package in as soon as possible. He will retake the SAT in August one last time to try and eek out a few more points, and then hopefully have everything except Dodmerb and nomination interviews done.
Here's how my course decriptions are structured:
Title: Where Course was Taken
Course decription paragraph
Text:
Additionals materials: Book list, etc.
Grading: Just a general description of assignments like class participation, chapter tests, final paper, etc. No percentages
Credit: either 1.0 or 0.5 (high school credits are not the same as college credits)
I did not include grade scale or grade as those were already included on the transcript. I did use the course syllabi to create my course descriptions. No reason to reinvent the wheel.
For me, a semester of college classes is the same as a high school class so a 1 semester English class is 0.5 high school credits. The only deviation I made from this was to count Calculus I and Calculus II as 1 high school credit each. They are covering the entirety of a high school class per semester. Much of this decision was based on workload. DS took DE psychology which could be a 1 credit high school class but he did not write a year's worth of papers or put in twice the work each week so I counted it as a 0.5 credits. His calculus classes did require twice as much work as a typical high school class (I used AP Calc AB as my guide for this). You will also have to submit college transcripts so no need to inflate high school transcripts IMHO.
My memory is fuzzy, but I think I only submitted my course decriptions to USAFA and not USMA. He did not finish his USNA application so I was not asked for it but I think they would have required it. You will only submit it if they ask for it. Most civillian schools did not want it either and just took my transcript at face value.
It is a great idea to finish this now. I am also in the "don't rush through the application" camp but my course descriptions document is 30 pages and took months to complete. You do not want to be up against a deadline when creating it.
Great information. Thank you so much. I currently have his 3+ hour dc courses listed as one credit, but I see your point. I may move his dc English courses down to .5 each and together they will make the full English credit. His calculus courses are 5 credit hours and sciences are 4 with labs. I will probably continue to count those as 1 credit each.
Do you weight the DC classes or just let the academies weight them if they want to?
We are definitely following the plan of submitting his best package, not the quickest, but at the same time trying to do it in a timely manner.
I wasn't aware that USMA doesn't require the synopsis, but it sounds like he will need it for the other two anyway, and possibly his other college applications as well.
Thank you again for all of the great advice and support you give in this forum.
I did not weight anything. I just used the standard GPA weighting with plus and minuses (but no extra for an A+...4.0 is the max). Colleges recalculate GPAs anyway so I didn't waste my time. I just annotated honors and DE on the transcript (No AP classes for us). I did have to calculate a weighted GPA for 1 college so DS could qualify for a merit scholarship but they provided an online calculator for me. It wasn't a big deal at all.
Ok thanks. I had to weight classes for my oldest son's University to qualify for a higher merit scholarship as well. I will just leave ds current transcript as is, send in his college transcripts as well, and let the academies do as they wish with them.
StarSon2028
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Thank you for this thread @Texark147 ! I hope you don't mind if I tack on some related questions re transcripts and course descriptions.
Is the consensus that with USMA we hold the course descriptions back unless requested? I'm not seeing an area to submit these nor am I seeing any instructions to homeschoolers wrt course descriptions (as USAFA does).
Also, do you piece together a large transcript PDF including your personal transcript and transcripts from outside course providers? OR do you submit these as separate transcript files?
Thanks!
Is the consensus that with USMA we hold the course descriptions back unless requested? I'm not seeing an area to submit these nor am I seeing any instructions to homeschoolers wrt course descriptions (as USAFA does).
Also, do you piece together a large transcript PDF including your personal transcript and transcripts from outside course providers? OR do you submit these as separate transcript files?
Thanks!
My son contacted admissions about the different transcripts. They told him to tell me to upload his homeschool transcript and have dual credit college transcripts mailed from the schools directly to USMA. Have them sent to Attention
irector of AdmissionsUnited States Military Academy
Official Mail & Distribution Center
646 Swift Road
West Point, New York 10996-1905
I used the website, fast transcripts to make his homeschool transcript. I was able to input all of the curriculum synopsis and they gave me a url to put into the transcript. If USMA wants to access those records, they will just need to put in the url and the website will have a list of the class descriptions. I will include all of the pages when I send it to USAFA and USNA , because they require the synopsis. I don't believe USMA requires it.
Hope this helps!
bookreader
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Just wanted to encourage you. My son (OG 2020) was homeschooled all the way through. There are plenty of homeschooled kids at WP.
I can't answer too many specific questions because I did this about 9 years ago and my memory is a tad fuzzy on the finer details. I did write a one-page transcript and then a multi-page addendum that included details on all of his extracurriculars, awards, job history, and a description of each course. College course descriptions came from the college website. It was all quite detailed.
I did get a phone call from an officer at WP with a specific question about one of his extracurricular clubs and I was able to give him the phone number to contact the person who headed up that club. All that to say - don't be surprised if you get a similar phone call.
My son was the first homeschooled kid that our congressional rep had ever given a Service Academy nomination to. And he was so impressed by my son that he actually gave him 2 of the slots on this slate (they can put up to ten names on their slate). And no, we didn't know this congressional rep, nor had we ever voted for him so my son got the nom solely on his own merits.
Good luck to your son!
I can't answer too many specific questions because I did this about 9 years ago and my memory is a tad fuzzy on the finer details. I did write a one-page transcript and then a multi-page addendum that included details on all of his extracurriculars, awards, job history, and a description of each course. College course descriptions came from the college website. It was all quite detailed.
I did get a phone call from an officer at WP with a specific question about one of his extracurricular clubs and I was able to give him the phone number to contact the person who headed up that club. All that to say - don't be surprised if you get a similar phone call.
My son was the first homeschooled kid that our congressional rep had ever given a Service Academy nomination to. And he was so impressed by my son that he actually gave him 2 of the slots on this slate (they can put up to ten names on their slate). And no, we didn't know this congressional rep, nor had we ever voted for him so my son got the nom solely on his own merits.
Good luck to your son!
Not in this case.....I am his homeschool teacher and I am the one responsible for making his transcript and writing the course descriptions and summary. It's my name in the portal under this section for school administrator. Things are a little different for homeschool families. The rest of the application is absolutely his responsibility.
Right. Candidates handle the app but the homeschool parent is responsible for a lot of admin (transcripts, course descriptions, EC verification, etc.) and works directly with Admissons. When my oldest applied to USMA and USAFA, they contacted me directly with any additional questions or needs.
I waited until USAFA contacted me to send the course descriptions. I uploaded my 2 page transcript but the course description file was too large (if I remember correctly) so I emailed it directly to the admissions team at their request.My son contacted admissions about the different transcripts. They told him to tell me to upload his homeschool transcript and have dual credit college transcripts mailed from the schools directly to USMA. Have them sent to Attention
United States Military Academy
Official Mail & Distribution Center
646 Swift Road
West Point, New York 10996-1905
I used the website, fast transcripts to make his homeschool transcript. I was able to input all of the curriculum synopsis and they gave me a url to put into the transcript. If USMA wants to access those records, they will just need to put in the url and the website will have a list of the class descriptions. I will include all of the pages when I send it to USAFA and USNA , because they require the synopsis. I don't believe USMA requires it.
Hope this helps!
My transcripts were my own creation amd only needed a signature to be official. College transcripts were send directly from the college electronically.