Accepted by MIT but doesn't want to join yet?

Journier
Wed, 09 May 2012 09:11:07 +0000

My son’s interviewer asked me why I didn’t send my son to MIT when he was twelve and made a 33 on his ACT coming out of homeschool. The answer was that I felt I should raise him ti adulthood. In truth, he also needed to complete certain courses first and learn how to manage a heavy courseload. His homeschool experience had allowed him to plow ahead at his own pace, but I had not required much formal schoolwork from him. Also, I and other family members had been prematurely promoted and found it unsettling to be so much younger than the others though we adapted. Making a much larger leap and being in a city on a large campus without a parent would seem irresponsible. I doubt that even if he were prepared that they would have accepted him. He was offered admission and a scholarship fir a smaller local school but I refused on many grounds. He needed to be in an age appropriate setting with other kids. He wouldn’t be served by a lesser education completed early. And, I couldn’t ensure his safety or be sure instructors would know how to handle such a young kid. His answers would have been too advanced for some if his classmates then, so why put him in a situation where he is likely to be lonely, vulnerable to inappropriate influence, and not necessarily challenged? Instead I put him in public school and heavily supplemented with college materials and advanced learning opportunities such as time with a NASA engineer, taking college classes unofficially in summer one at a time with handpicked profs, and summer programs. His test scores were perfect on the first try by high school and he ran out of math and physics, returning ti homeschool for self-study. But, he is still probably an average student at Caltech. I don’t for a minute regret keeping him at home till he was 18. Those kids who go to too schools earlier have to not only be exceedingly brilliant but they also need to have organizational, concentration, and time management skills far better than many adults. And, you have ti be ready to skip, fly through, or endure a bumpy ride through some developmental stages. I spoke years ago with the mom off a kid who did it. She walked him to every class and couldn’t really work as a result. Her son was happy academicalky but really had to work hard to deal with two separate worlds–middle school age playmates and adult classmates.