"Hold my root beer" - the Russell M. Nelson thread

[jay santos]

Nothing that you don't already know. To clarify, admission to BYU is based partially on region. Utah students typically face a higher bar in regards to GPA/ACT scores than other regions. As far as answering the question posed from another poster about as the importance of Seminary graduation to BYU admission; it's not a requirement but would be difficult to gain entry without it since BYU is very competitive. The only student I know of from my kids' high school that got admitted to BYU without being a seminary graduate was a scholarship football player.

According to document titled New Freshman Index 2013-2014 that was released by the Mormon Leaks people, there is an index with 100 total possible points. 76 of them coming from GPA 4.0 = 40 and ACT 36 high. 24 points coming from extracurricular, seminary, and other. "Geographical Area" is an item on the list. "add 1.5 for Alaska and locales east of Colorado". Max points for seminary is 3.75.

[Walter Sobchak]

That's too bad. My kids loved most of their seminary teachers.

The professional seminary teacher pool probably stocked with a whole lotta crazy. To this day, anytime Stairway to Heaven is played, I remember my 9th grade seminary teacher playing that song backward on a turntable that he had brought to class. Don't listen to Rock and Roll kids, it's Satan's music!

I tuned out (pun!) seminary after that. For the next 3½ years, I used my released time to do homework. With my AP-heavy academic schedule + 2-a-day swim practice, release time became kind of a godsend.

Seminary teachers around here are parent volunteers and almost without exception have kids enrolled in EMS. The outside-of-release-time experience seems like it is an entirely different beast. My kids love attending seminary for the reasons seminary was intended, because the spiritual instruction is generally engaging without being preachy.

[MartyFunkhouser]

The professional seminary teacher pool probably stocked with a whole lotta crazy. To this day, anytime Stairway to Heaven is played, I remember my 9th grade seminary teacher playing that song backward on a turntable that he had brought to class. Don't listen to Rock and Roll kids, it's Satan's music!

I tuned out (pun!) seminary after that. For the next 3½ years, I used my released time to do homework. With my AP-heavy academic schedule + 2-a-day swim practice, release time became kind of a godsend.

Seminary teachers around here are parent volunteers and almost without exception have kids enrolled in EMS. The outside-of-release-time experience seems like it is an entirely different beast. My kids love attending seminary for the reasons seminary was intended, because the spiritual instruction is generally engaging without being preachy.

My 9th grade seminary teacher bragged about how when he got married he told his wife that she had to drop out of school (giving up her full ride scholarship) so that they could immediately have kids and she could focus on being his wife. He also said that women should never work when they have kids.

[Dwight Schr-ute]

Wine would be much more appealing to me too. I have no desire to try beer, or coffee and tea for that matter.

All I know is that my testimony of abstaining from wine has been absolutely shattered in the last 12 months ever since my wife started occasionally ordering a glass with dinner during date night. The healthy navels and marrow filled bones may be different than those promised in Section 89, and I’ve been more than fine with the extra weariness.


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[LVAllen]

All I know is that my testimony of abstaining from wine has been absolutely shattered in the last 12 months ever since my wife started occasionally ordering a glass with dinner during date night. The healthy navels and marrow filled bones may be different than those promised in Section 89, and I’ve been more than fine with the extra weariness.


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::

[Jeff Lebowski]

The professional seminary teacher pool probably stocked with a whole lotta crazy. To this day, anytime Stairway to Heaven is played, I remember my 9th grade seminary teacher playing that song backward on a turntable that he had brought to class. Don't listen to Rock and Roll kids, it's Satan's music!

I tuned out (pun!) seminary after that. For the next 3½ years, I used my released time to do homework. With my AP-heavy academic schedule + 2-a-day swim practice, release time became kind of a godsend.

Seminary teachers around here are parent volunteers and almost without exception have kids enrolled in EMS. The outside-of-release-time experience seems like it is an entirely different beast. My kids love attending seminary for the reasons seminary was intended, because the spiritual instruction is generally engaging without being preachy.

That's funny.

I had one seminary teacher who was a little goofy, but a good dude. The rest were good.

[Bo Diddley]

That's funny.

I had one seminary teacher who was a little goofy, but a good dude. The rest were good.

All of mine we great.

On an unrelated note, one left the Church years later.

[Northwestcoug]

I remember two teachers. Both very diligent, but not great teachers.

[MartyFunkhouser]

That's funny.

I had one seminary teacher who was a little goofy, but a good dude. The rest were good.

Mine were pretty much all bad, but my 9th grade teacher was easily the worst.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Mine were pretty much all bad, but my 9th grade teacher was easily the worst.

Ha. Of course.

[Pelado]

I liked my release-time teachers better than the EMS teacher in 9th grade. But they were all fine. Any of them would have written a glowing recommendation for my BYU application, had it been required at the time.

[New Mexican Disaster]

I forget, can an active American LDS kid get into BYU without graduating from seminary?

My daughter got in and she attended seminary for about one week as a freshman. So, yes, it can be done.

[Non Sequitur]

My daughter got in and she attended seminary for about one week as a freshman. So, yes, it can be done.

I went to EMS half a dozen times and got into BYU. I'm not sure my seminary attendance ever came up. The first day I went, my buddy's mom was the teacher. For some reason she had us singing primary songs. Give said the Little Stream, I believe. The lesson had something to do with being child-like. Graduation was never an option after that. At one point my dad tried to compel me to go to seminary by telling me that if I didn't go to seminary, I couldn't drive the car. I told him if I couldn't drive the car, I wasn't going to Church any more. Seminary attendance never came up again. Surprising as it may seem, I was kind of a prick when I was a kid.

[Soccermom]

My daughter got in and she attended seminary for about one week as a freshman. So, yes, it can be done.

Yeah, my son was encouraged to apply to BYU. He said he didn't want to go to BYU and even if he did, he didn't do seminary so he didn't stand a chance. The seminary teacher told him that belief is a myth and that he just needs an endorsement from his bishop and seminary teacher or principal. He still refused to apply. Makes me kind of sad as I think he would have really enjoyed BYU.

[Brian]

I had mostly good teachers.
My 9th grade teacher in JR high was a bit of a crusty old hard liner, but the rest were really good guys.
I took EMS at the high school building in 10th grade because I wanted to take an extra class. But I didn’t go consistently enough for credit, and so didn’t graduate from seminary. My grade 11 guy was a really good RB at highland HS back in the day and showed us some highlight films. That was fun. For grade 12 I had Vaughn Featherstones son, who was a lot of fun. Very unorthodox, fun lessons. I don’t know how he made it through the seminary teacher program......

All in all, I enjoyed it.

EMS outside of Utah can be very hit and miss (in my three state experience). Scary hit and miss.
My daughter didn’t graduate, and we didn’t make her go. A lot of it was counterproductive.