Precollege Programming

Office of Precollege Programming
Western Michigan University
Kalamazoo MI 49008-5288 USA
(269) 387-2773

Working With Your Home School

While most schools are familiar with and extremely supportive of the Academically Talented Youth Program, others may need help understanding how to accommodate your needs. Below you will find a list of situations you may encounter and some tips for how to handle them. You may find that there is not a solution to your particular situation listed, but these answers may spark you to find a solution on your own. Our staff are working hard to make sure all our participating schools understand what we do and what your needs are in order to minimize confusion and to strengthen cooperation between our program and your home school.

No! Our program not only covers appropriate grade level content for the year, it will exceed it. You may need to show your counselor, teacher, or principal a course description. Your school should understand that taking a class in the same subject area for which you are enrolled in the program is redundant. You will have far too much homework and not enough time to do it properly in that subject area. You may be assigned to an English or math class for pupil accounting purposes, but the rest of the week during that time period when you are not at ATYP you should be in a quiet location where you can work on homework鈥攏ot in an additional English or math class. If you encounter an issue, call our office right away and allow us to contact your school on your behalf.

We advise that you have a seminar/study hall for your last class period to cut down on missing non-ATYP classes. However, this may not always be an option. This will put you in the position of being responsible for materials covered in that particular class. See the "Survival Tips" sheet for more information.

One choice would be to dual-enroll at a local college. Your public home school is required to pay a portion of the fees for dual-enrollment classes. The total amount schools pay differs depending upon your school鈥檚 per pupil allowance and the number of classes offered each semester at your school. If you do not wish to dual enroll, we recommend signing up for upper-level electives, AP classes, or junior or senior level honors classes. Your counselors should make this accommodation. If you run into any roadblocks, contact our office as soon as possible and let us clear the way for you.