Have you ever wondered how students attend Independent Studies while going to Gilbert High School? As you are reading this I am here to tell you all about my journey throughout being enrolled in Independent Studies and Gilbert.
Due to COVID I was doing online school from half of 7th grade to 8th grade, Once freshman year came around I had the option to go back to school in person at Loara High School. I had heard about Independent Studies from my mom and decided to give homeschooling a try. At first I was very hesitant to the idea of being homeschooled but I was forced to try it either way. During the beginning I hated it because I was put in an online course but I had switched around the first week to do paper work. It kinda grew on me because it was slow paced and I had a lot of time to work on the assignments, especially knowing that in a regular school it’s hard to focus in class or let alone do my homework on time due to my ADHD because I was juggling 6 classes at once and I was expected to finish each assignment in a short amount of time.
With independent studies each assignment goes by credits, you have the choice to pick what day you are coming in to turn in your assignments, and get a new one. For example me; I go every Friday, turn in my 2 credits, and get 2-3 new credits the same day, each class is supposed to have about 8 credits and once those 8 are turned in you get put into a new class. It’s really simple and is easy to keep up with given the fact that you have one week to turn in your work. My current classes are Drawing and Painting, Government, and English 4.
Sophomore year I wanted to try going back to regular school and be more social to try and get over my anxiety. So I did exactly that, I enrolled into Loara High School but I felt like I didn’t belong there, Especially with the way I dress and my personal interests. It was hard for me to concentrate in class and to keep up with homework and i started to fail all my classes, Once the first semester ended I transferred back to independent studies and finished the rest of my sophomore year there.
Once junior year started I was in Independent Studies like normal for the first 3 months of the school year, then in October/September I was starting to have problems with my mental health again, I was always irritable and my mood swings were getting worse. Then I had the choice to join Gilberts ROP courses as a way to get out of the house, I got put in the Business Design class and I ended up really liking it because it helped me start selling clothes i make. In the beginning of this year I got put in another class which was Digital Design and that class helped me with new ways and ideas of making clothes.
This year is my last year and I am still doing concurrent enrollment only this time taking Journalism, and Advanced Digital Design, so when the end of the year comes around I will be graduating early from Polaris Independent Studies.
