I sympathize with parents who are trying to figure out the best approach for a child who is very advanced cognitively… The normal give-and-take of peer relations is difficult for any odd person out.
PG (and others who share that opinion), when you were in school, did you never form the impression that the students around you made a lot of mistakes? In group projects, did you never think that if the project was going to be done right, you would have to do it yourself? I would be willing to bet that at least one of these was true of you. Did you never have to block out the word that occurred to you most naturally in what you were about to say, because you realized that it would sound “egg-headed” to the other person?
I think a mixed strategy is best. The young person can take college classes at the appropriate level, and the parents can find extra-curriculars that suit the age and physical skill level of the young person. I think it would be good to have a reduced college load, to allow time for pure play. The advantage of taking classes at the appropriate level is that the student learns the benefit of listening to others, who may sometimes have better ideas (instead of very rarely having better ideas). The student can have normal-ish conversations with other students, once they start to forget his age. The student may have to work at some of the concepts, instead of understanding them immediately and (in some regions of the country and some classes) better than the teacher.
Students who learn stringed instruments via the Suzuki method wind up many years ahead of what seemed to be “normal” for most talented young musicians a generation ago (talented, but not hyper-talented). This is the new norm. Furthermore, it is pretty closely parallel to the level of STEM advancement of the young man described by the OP.
I think the terminology “gifted” already starts to set up problems for the young person. He is just different, and there is nothing wrong with recognizing the type of difference he has, and accommodating it as well as possible.
I read a different article about this family than the one posted. They sound like they have done a good job recognizing that their son is unique and that he wouldn’t do well in traditional schooling. They didn’t ask anyone to change things to fit him, just designed their own program and then used the one at Texas Tech.
The boy sounds like he enjoys contact with others and said the best thing about high school was graduation, when he got to meet all the people he’d been online with for years. I don’t think the parents are expecting a traditional college experience but will take what they can get from his time as an undergrad.
My sons classmate entered UCB as a teen. His parents didn’t need to uproot themselves for him to attend college. At grad school, he was left out of some ECs cuz he couldn’t drink.
In my county, bright HS kids can attend all their classes at the local U. This works.
My concern in general (I don’t know about this specific case) would be that very often, extremely academically advanced children may be lopsided - brilliant at math, for instance, but not at the same level in humanities or languages.
Those remarks about living in a retarded world show a lack of comprehension. It is extremely frustrating to be with people who don’t understand things very quickly, we all tend to gravitate towards people at our level. It can be very frustrating for gifted kids when their teachers don’t comprehend them. A mix of development and innate intelligence 99 percent of the world just doesn’t get in gifted kids. Think outside the box, folks. Imagine yourself the least intelligent one at work, in social circles. Now imagine yourself unable to do things or talk with people because they just can’t understand what you are trying to say. You are usually spared being in the position of gifted kids when you are in that vast middle pool of humanity. YOUR lack of comprehension doesn’t mean those highly gifted kids don’t suffer from it.
Consider those people who do not fit within two standard deviations of the average/norm/whatever. Rare, even among college educated and CC posters. Bravo to parents who can see what is needed and can take care of exceptional needs for their kids, despite attitudes of the merely bright.
I think the OPs parents are making a mistake. There is a lot to be gained from high school and the social environment that goes with it. Virtually all of the Ivies do not prefer underage kids. There are simply too many problems associated with it. Cornell seems to be the lone exception to that rule. One of my kids finished calculus BC in the seventh grade and went on to finish high school at the normal age. They have lots of friends and looking back would never have skipped grades or enrolled full time in college at an early age. (They did take college classes along with their high school classes)
My husband’s younger sister started at the University of Wisconsin when she was 16, back in 1971. It was a disaster. She was in over her head and got into drugs. She has never been the same, according to him. His mother says she wishes they hadn’t let the girl go to college so young. Every case is different, though!
Mild degrees of skipping grades used to be fairly common.
I skipped a grade in elementary school and therefore went to college at 17. I could easily have gone at 16; many of the top students at my high school compressed their high school programs so that they could graduate a year early. But I thought 16 was too young.
I was fine at college at 17 – perhaps because my classmates (at Cornell, as it happens) included many other 17-year-olds who had also been accelerated somewhere along the line… My sister also went to college at 17, after compressing her high school program, and she was miserable. To this day, she regrets the decision. She says she simply wasn’t ready psychologically for college at that point, and it took her by surprise.
But perhaps this is different from the situation being discussed in this thread. A young person who goes to college at 16 or 17 expects (or at least hopes for) a fairly typical college life. One who goes to college at 12 does not.
I somewhat agree with your opinion for some kids, including my own daughter, who is quite gifted but is short of being profoundly gifted. She is going to enter high school as a freshman this Fall with 60+ college credits completed. Her math is good on average but mediocre compare to your kid’s.
BUT, I have seen other kids so advanced in intelligence and achievement that it is impossibly painful to do that. So their parents are saving them by sending them to college early. It is true that they usually forfeit ug degree at an Ivy, as virtually all of the Ivies don’t care them. But that’s not what they really want anyway, and often they manage a PhD program at an Ivy later. It is very rare achievement that your kid finished calculus BC in the seventh grade. But there are kids (at least a kid) who takes an upper level research course at a prestigious university at the same age. They do it because they love to do it, and not because their parents pushes them.
Spending majority of youth with age peers is a relatively new concept in human civilization. There sure are benefits. But there are negative consequences too. And a few kids certainly can be better off without it. Mine has been better off without it so far. Now she is probably better with it. But some kids are still better off without it. It’s all different. There are variations in human genes.
"A young person who goes to college at 16 or 17 expects (or at least hopes for) a fairly typical college life. One who goes to college at 12 does not. "
Someone who is gifted does not necessarily need to be lopsided. James Simon a distinguished mathematician is one of the richest people in this country is but one example
When I was about 12 or 13 I was tested for math giftedness and the principal met with my parents and said - you have 2 choices. You can enroll her in college math classes (thus disrupting my entire school schedule) or you can just skip a grade in math and just go to the high school for first period, take math there and then walk back down to middle school for second period and have the rest of your classes with your classmates as usual. My parents chose the second and I’m very grateful they did. I was bookish and introverted enough without making me a social pariah.
There was a kid who went to a local university in my country at 9. All his classmates were 18 and they treated him as a little boy and keep padding his head in class. He had been struggling in other humanities subjects during his time in college. He admitted that he had no social life in college, no friends … He spent 7 hours a day doing math. He graduated with a master degree at age of 13. Then he went on to study math at UT Austin. We didn’t hear him for years. . His brother is also talented in math/science and was accepted by Oxford at the age of 14/15.
PG, what was it that you had the possibility to take in college math, if 9th grade math was fine as an alternative? Many colleges offer courses that overlap with two or three years of high school courses, but it would be fairly weird to take calculus without having trigonometry.
I’m not sure where people get this idea that attending high school will magically impart social skills. Not everyone is involved in the social life of high school, and the environment is strange and not really reflective of the real world for those who are. Obviously hollywood portrays a stereotype, but there are some elements of truth in all these movies about high school. I personally had to unlearn a lot of bad habits that I think were caused by going to a public high school where everyone sort of knew each other already and I had more limited interaction with adults that I did in college.
QM - beats me. I don’t remember. This was 40 years ago.
Warbrain - no one is saying that hs is a magical social place. I was never a " popular girl " and I kept to myself and a few bookish friends but at least I had a fighting chance. That’s also why I was better served by going to a college with Greek life,football games, etc. If I’d gone to the U of Chicago versus Northwestern, for example, I would have tumbled way more down the rabbit hole of nerddom. It would not have been good for me. I needed people to pull me out of that, not reinforce it.
I respect your mathematical capability, PG, but I am not sure that your high school principal actually knew what he was talking about. With some rare exceptions in terms of mathematical interests and advanced reading by the student, the options he proposed do not make sense.
I think that the choice to stay in high school makes good sense for some who might move to college instead, depending on what the interests and values of the student are. On the other hand, differences between people and–importantly–differences between high schools mean that is not the optimal solution for everyone. While “nerddom” may look like a rabbit hole when viewed from the outside, it has its charms. In the development of social skills, it is great to have a group of friends with whom one can converse freely.
I actually enjoyed high school; but my experiences as a prof have shown me how good my (public) high school really was, and how many other high schools could have been much worse places.
To add: I am not actually regarding your high-school principal with disrespect, PG, just thinking that either he was no mathematician, or he was a very unusual one–Wiley Post high school?
Assuming that it was people at the school (and not parents) who arranged for testing for giftedness in mathematics, that is already the sign of an unusually good school.
The talk about gifted education made me think about how we as a country deal with extreme giftedness vs. how we deal with extreme talent in areas like athletics (especially now during Olympics season).
We have many training programs, for kids as young as 12 who show athletic promise—my son was friends in junior high with two kids who spent their high school years at the IMG Academy program in Florida and went on to play professional soccer after graduation, for example. They didn’t have to go to college to accomplish their goal of training and playing at a higher level, and they were able to do so with other kids who were their peers in terms of talent and drive.
I wish we had more opportunities like that for extreme academic giftedness.
You now know as much as I do, QM. This was a reasonably affluent suburban public school in the Philadelphia area. I really don’t know what prompted any discussion, testing, or any particulars beyond what I’ve shared. All I know is that I did the latter option, enjoyed it and did well. I’ve always liked being with “my tribe” of smart people but they didn’t have to be off-the-charts gifted. And I’ve missed out on what could have been some meaningful friendships in life because I thought I was “above” certain people intellectually and therefore they weren’t worth my time. That’s not a characteristic of myself I’m necessarily proud of. So I think that’s why I reacted negatively to the “it’s like hanging with retarded people” quote upthread.