We have a thirteen year old high school junior that will be graduating at age fifteen. He arrived at this point via a series of grade skips (three total) and also a year and a half of home schooling (middle school) during which time he subject accelerated by two additional years in math and science. He will have spent four years in high school (having entered as a freshman at age eleven) and is quite socially normal (he is also tall and quite comparably mature to his grade peers).
My question is whether he will be at a disadvantage applying to the most competitive colleges in that his credentials extracurricularly speaking can't really be compared to students three to four years older? High school sports really weren't an option when he entered at age eleven. His other extracurricular activities are on par (academic clubs, recreational sports, volunteering) with his grade peers but nothing particularly special compared to his Ivy bound peers.
By graduation he will have taken 12 AP courses in virtually (all the sciences, BC math, SS, language, etc.) and his CUM will probably place his rank within the top three in his class of 300). SATs are 800M/740WR/760CR with 800's on Physics and Math subject tests.
His high school is quite strong and usually sends five to ten students to Ivy's/MIT/Stanford per year (total, not to each school).
How much of a disadvantage will he be having skipped three grades (and hence lost opportunities to do really special extracurricular types of activities) as compared to his age appropriate classmates? He needed the challenge over all of these years but it would be a pretty big disappointment if he can't attend college with intellectual peers because he was shortchanged his teenage years in high school. Will his age be a "hook" that might compensate for weaknesses in his "resume" or will the colleges simply expect him to be "on par" regardless of his age? Had he never skipped, he would have cruised in as valedictorian and had plenty of time for the extras and would have been bored beyond imagination at school.
I know that there will likely be responses to this post to consider smaller, less known schools (more one on one, could stand out more, etc.) but that isn't what he (or we) want for him. Our primary concern is that his college experience have lots of opportunities to have social experiences with lots of intellectual peers. Grade skipping allowed him to do that with his intellectual peers (age adjusted), but we really feel that a selective "brand name" school is where he will be able to feel at home and really find friends.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
