I Flunked Ninth Grade, So I Get Why Your Teen Doesn't Care

Hey, friends, how's school going with your teens right now? The other day my husband and I were sitting with a dad we're friends with, and he was venting about how little his teens want to do with school. There's always a fight over homework, everything else matters more, their grades are slipping, and the mood at home is lousy.

My first thought: sounds a lot like me in ninth grade. In eighth and ninth grade I had everything on my mind except school. I barely squeaked through eighth grade, and at the end of ninth I had a five in math and physics (on the German scale of 1 to 6, a five is failing). That meant I'd officially flunked.

So many other things just mattered more to me in ninth grade. Friendships, boys, going out for the first time, the first parties. There was absolutely no room in my head for school stuff. I honestly didn't care, I couldn't concentrate, and all my parents' kind pleading just bounced right off me.

So there I was, flunked. Back then, though, you could take a retest at the end of summer break, and if you passed, you could still move up. I was totally shocked to see two fives on my report card, and I spent almost the whole summer with a tutor.

While all my friends were hanging out at the public pool, I was studying, cramming last year's material into my brain. At the end of the break I sat there shaking through the retest, and I passed. It turned out to be a real lesson, because from then on I knew I had to put in at least some effort for school. I wasn't a star student, I was average, and that was good enough for me.

When school comes second

So whenever I hear that a teenager seems totally scatterbrained and couldn't care less about school, I get it. And I don't think it's the end of the world if there's a pretty lousy semester because the teen simply has other things on their mind. My two oldest are still doing well in school, but I hope I'll find a good middle ground if that ever changes.

A middle ground between “I understand that everything else is really exciting right now” and “Come on, a bare minimum of studying has to happen.” I'm sure it won't be easy…

What does annoy me is when parents act like the Abitur (the diploma you need for university in Germany) is the only way to finish school. I'm determined not to drag my kids through it. If a child is struggling and only experiencing failure, if they're more hands-on or see themselves in a vocational apprenticeship, I think the Abitur is absolutely secondary. I know plenty of people who did an apprenticeship first and then, in some cases, went back later to get their Abitur. Or didn't, and were perfectly happy in their jobs.

Especially in the age of AI, when none of us knows yet how whole lines of work will change, it surely isn't a bad thing to know how to do something with your hands. But mostly I want to keep reminding myself: even if a child leaves school earlier, that doesn't mean the learning is over. We'll all be working for so many years that there will always be chances for further training and continuing education.

I'm determined not to let school completely define my relationship with my kids. I want to encourage them to really dig in now and then, but also to give them the security of knowing that a bad grade doesn't make them a worse person. And if I see that school has turned into nothing but misery, I would support them in taking a different path.

What's it like at your house? Is school a big source of conflict, or does everything just roll along easily? Tell us about your experiences!