Junior high school diploma

The following is a guest post by Radhika Morabia a high school dropout and diploma holder.

It was May of 2014. I'd just received a call saying I officially failed school. They were being nice and just counting it as if I wasn’t enrolled for the whole semester. It was as if the dozens of hours I spent worrying and attempting to catch up counted for nothing.

Growing up, I was a good student. I got As, and at worst, Bs. I joined the GATE program when I was 8 (you take an IQ test and if you score high enough, you join a special program that looks good on paper, but generally does nothing.), I was in all honors in middle school, I was in as many APs (Advanced Placement, or college-level courses) as I could be in high school, eventually reaching 4 APs in my Junior year. I was on track to go to one of the top 30 universities in the US.

Things took a turn in November of 2011 (my Freshman year of high school), when I took on too much at once (typical high school advice) and suffered an injury that caused permanent damage to my knees. Thanks to incompetent, judgmental doctors and my own denial, I let it get worse and worse until I had to leave school. I began to be in and of alternative schools, sometimes heading back to my normal high school because I could never understand the alternative schools. In the end, though, I was at a seemingly perfect alternative program, where I only had to show up twice and week and could do my work whenever I wanted, and I finally failed.

There were no other options in front of me. We tried every alternative program that would guarantee a normal high school diploma, and I just couldn’t do it. Finally, when I failed, I gave up. I said I was dropping out of school, including skipping college.

I’d been involved in the alternative online world for years now, and saw plenty of normal people, just like me, doing jobs that never asked for any kind of formal credential. I knew I could do it, so I’d been studying web development for the past few months. I would eventually drop that and pursue freelance marketing, which leads us to where I am today.

But, my parents wouldn’t let me drop out so easily. It was fine if I wanted to pursue work, but what if that failed without a formal degree? I needed some kind of backup plan.

So, I decided to do the bare minimum it took to graduate. I finally completed that a few weeks ago, with a total investment of less than 10 hours of work.

That’s right. I’m officially a high school dropout and a graduate. I’m also making enough money to live on without ever mentioning my formal credentials, which is the whole reason people get a degree, right?

If you or someone you know is considering dropping out of high school, I believe I’ve now been on this path long enough to offer some advice.

NOTE: Everything mentioned here only applies to the US, and if you want to get specific, to California. Look up your own laws and alternatives, I only know what works for where I live.

Step 1: Why do you want to drop out of high school?
You seriously need to ask yourself why you want to drop out.

Is it because of some social issues you’d rather run away from? Is it because you feel like you’re working towards no gain? Is there a better opportunity waiting for you that school is keeping you from?

With most of these problems, there’s alternatives to dropping out entirely. You can transfer schools, you can take easier classes, you can join an alternative school, etc..