I am currently having a conversation with my son's school about accelerating him in all subjects while continuing to call him his grade by age. I'm wondering if there are any rules or laws surrounding the labeling of grade level.
I agree with both of the above posters-- but I also have some direct experience with this one, too.
This IS what we did with my DD for her "second" gradeskip-- from 7th through 9th grades, she was
taking coursework a year (or more) beyond her on-paper placement.
Complications not mentioned previously:
a) NCLB/state testing will be for level/designation year, NOT placement, and testing at the correct level is important administratively... it can get complicated, but as long as everyone is aware and cooperative, it's not insurmountable.
b) different states have different rules about when graduation cohort years are assigned officially. My DD needed permission directly from the state board of education in order to take high school coursework
for credit without being assigned a graduation cohort year as a 9th grader.
c) as noted, NMSQT/PSAT complications regarding expected graduation dates and cohort years, etc.
My reasoning is that by doing this, he can keep his options open (I'm thinking mostly about dual enrollment options). It would just be a matter of paperwork to change his grade level up if need be. I've been told that he will receive high school credit for high school level courses taken in middle school.
Are there any potential pitfalls to this plan that I'm not seeing? Aside from it being weird, I mean
Just a matter of paperwork if you change your minds? Well, mayyyyyybe-- but that can be a bigger deal than it should be if you get a district administrator who is in a dither over keeping your kid enrolled longer (enrollment $), or simply doesn't LIKE the idea of early graduation, and if you run out of authentic challenge ahead of schedule, that can mean your child drops out with no diploma as a least-worst option... it also means that you have to be VERY careful when you make that jump. We recently had to think about this since it would have messed up eligibility for NMS and NHS both to have done the skip any later than last January for DD.
High school credit for high school coursework...
Hmmm. Again, this varies by administrator.
Get it in writing. We did and I'm
eternally grateful that I had the foresight to do that, even though they made me feel slighly skeezy about it at the time. (What? You don't trust us?
Why, no. No. Actually, I.. er... don't. Because y'all break your word all. the. time. )
Related to that, be VERY sure you know what the state, district, and school each have to say about the accumulation of credits, specific course requirements, and automatic graduation-- and "Full time enrollment" as well as any age restrictions which exist for "dual enrollment" or other alternative paths out of high school. In my own state, this constitutes a really formidable maze of regulations.
Caveat Emptor. Big time.
Okay, the other thing which will be a problem here is that it causes a LOT of confusion in terms of any academically-oriented extracurriculars, and in the end, it MAY be a cause for some of those external agencies to simply shut you out because of suspicions that you're trying to do an end-run around eligibility for competitive benefit or something. BTDT. It means that you're darned if you do, and darned if you don't. If your child is a 10th grader, they're in a different competitive category for academic competitions, for 4H, for Lego Robotics, etc. So if your child is TAKING all 10th grade coursework, and yet you're CALLING him/her a 9th (or 8th) grader,
what gives?If it provides a competitive advantage, you'll be accused of cheating, and if you acknowledge that and go with the 'older' age bracket, then you'll be accused of "playing fast and loose" by not using a SINGLE designation of "what grade/age is the entrant" for
everything. It's no-win, actually.
See what I mean? We ran into a lot of that. The upshot was that they didn't know WHAT to make of DD, and so they stalled and stonewalled until deadlines went by and she was effectively shut out. Now, some of that can be attributed to disability access issues in her case, but by no means all. In the end, it was actually just easier to jump that grade and have things realigned, even though it means that she's been gradeskipped a full 3y.
