A home-taught student who didn't attend a traditional high school may not necessarily have trouble coping with college.
RC first-year student Emily Linn, who has been taught at home since eighth grade, said she can manage both academic and extra-curricular activities at the University with ease.
With 17 credits this semester, she also takes harp lessons, participates in an acting group in East Quad, serves as a hall representative and volunteers for Safewalk.
A campus of more than 36,000 students does not seem to intimidate her, even after being in a school of one for many years. In fact, she said she enjoys her school life.
"I love the fact that it is a huge school," Linn said. "I especially like the Residential College here because of the types of classes offered, the language program (and) the people in East Quad."
Linn, 18, said her class formats and discussion sections at the University mirror the classes she used to take.
"I feel I am responsible for my own education," Linn said.
She said many people have stereotypes of home-schooling as staying home with parents and having no contacts with the community. She said people should not generalize home-schooling because every experience is different.
"You're facing people, working with people in the world, as opposed to people sitting in classrooms with teachers," Linn said "It's not like I am all by myself and go to (the) library myself. I learn in different settings."
During high school, Linn worked closely with Clonlara School, an Ann Arbor private school that supervises home-schoolers nationwide. The school has support teachers who answer home-schoolers' questions, guide them in their studies and keep track of home-schoolers' educational progress.
A year after Linn quit attending traditional school, she and four other home-schoolers started a group called "the older home-schoolers' group," which later expanded its membership to about 75 students. Linn said the group was a great opportunity for her to meet many people from diverse backgrounds and age groups. She had the chance to meet interesting people, including a girl who bred sheep and another who was a pilot.
Linn said her parents were her role models and advisers, helping her to solve any problems that came up during her studies.
She said the advantage of studying at her own pace gave her extra time to travel around the world and develop her own interests.
Linn has taken six years of harp lessons at the University's School of Music. At the age of 15, she joined a bike trip and traveled from Amsterdam to Paris. In past summers, she took art classes in Paris.
And every year, when most students went back to school in the fall, Linn went with her parents to different cities in the United States including Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and Boston. Linn went with her parents for a three-week trip to England, Italy and France and stayed a week in each country to visit museums and historical sites.
Although Linn looks back at her home-schooling experience with pride, she said she did not know the program suited her when she first started.
Linn's mother, Diane, agreed. She said she worried about her daughter's social life and transition into college when she left regular school. She said she used the agreement with Clonlara School to ensure her daughter had fulfilled all the state requirements under a regular school curriculum.
"With Clonlara, we (kept) track of what Emily has done. We work closely with the faculty," she said.
Linn's mother described Emily's home-schooling experience as a combination of traditional high school and private home education. She said she wanted her daughter to have a smooth transition to the college level.
By contacting the University admissions office, Diane Linn said she designed an educational program for her daughter that both enriched Emily's understanding of the world and prepared her well for college.
Linn said home-schooling brought her closer to her parents. Diane Linn said that she and her daughter became best friends through their home-schooling time.
"We always felt we could trust her values and instincts about the world. We felt that we were so close we almost breathed together," Diane Linn said.
"It's time for her to fly free. It's just a natural step for her in growing."
MARGARET MYERS/Daily
RC first-year student Emily Linn reads in the East Quad courtyard. She was a home-schooled student.