Anyone have any experience with this program? My 14 year old daughter is interested in the possibility of attending in the fall. I’m interested in hearing from parents who have or have had girls in the program. My daughter is hoping to discern whether it would be more beneficial to begin college at 14 at a small, third tier school, albiet one of the only universities in the country that offers an opportunity like this, or to slog through 3 more years of high school and attend a top tier school.
Ive never met any 14 year olds ready for college. Aounds like that math program “If your child is Calculus ready by age 11 they may be a fit for our program.”
Are other options available? DE at a local college or university? Homeschooling and taking all advanced coursework? Other options might provide her more of what she wants.
I know kids who started college at a young age and for our family we opted to not have our kids graduate early. We homeschool, so we have a lot of academic freedom. With online options (everything from MIT opencourseware/Coursera type classes to online schools like AoPS/Signum University/Stanford Online High School/numerous others, Skype tutors (my Dd studied Russian via Skype), etc, there are so many opportunities to be challenged and explore interesting subjects.
I know one person who attended there, but she was “normal College aged.” Another decided to stay in regular HS. My son took all GT and AP classes in HS, an advanced math class at CC during his senior year, and went to JHU CTY and JHU for actual college credit in the summer.
Have you asked the program if you and your daughter could be put in touch with some current/recent students and parents?
College serves multiple functions. One is academic – an opportunity to learn and study at an advanced level. I started college at age 16, and I’m pretty sure that a highly gifted teenager would benefit from college level academics. But there are alternatives other than a private college geared to early entrants.
But college also serves as an opportunity to form relationships with peers and professors, and to develop a foundation for a future career. And a young teenager is simply not going to be able to experience or accomplish the things that a college age student can.
I think that you have framed your question in terms of a narrow dichotomy without considering other alternatives:
“small, third tier school” or “slog through 3 more years of high school”.
Mary Baldwin’s COA is around $40K … if you can handle that financially, might your daughter do better at an elite boarding school (the types of school that is an Ivy feeder)? It would still be high school, but in a more rigorous academic setting with a different peer group, perhaps a better fit?
Or are there other alternatives you can consider? Can your daughter’s high school schedule be adjusted to allow her to spend a semester or year abroad as a foreign exchange student. (My daughter spent a semester abroad her junior year).
There are a lot of other options you might consider to broaden your d’s experience – dual enrollment, for example – or simply a higher level of involvement in a time consuming EC that goes outside and beyond her high school. (Which would, of course, depend on her own interests).
So expand the array of options.
Because yes, your daughter could definitely be selling herself short to attend a lower ranked regional college, and the undergrad she attends may very well impact her future in many ways.
I think schools like Mary Baldwin do serve an important purpose-- if your daughter is truly unhappy at her high school and there aren’t other viable options, it may be that early college is the best option. Just move beyond that either/or thinking. What are your daughter’s personal and academic interests and aspirations? What other things can she be doing to pursue her goals beyond a hurried pursuit of a college degree? What does she see herself doing after college? And what do you as her parents expect she will be doing 4 years hence?
Take a look at Bard at Simons Rock as well as boarding schools (where there are almost always freshmen in calculus classes.) Always good to understand the options. I would prioritize those which give her a peer group and social activities and maintain regular college options. Academics are important, but so is personal growth.
USC allows students to enter after junior year.
Along the lines of the boarding school suggestion above, consider United World Colleges. I have know three international students who were educated through them- 2 from the Wales campus and one from the India campus. These are smart engaged students.
There are several campuses around the world. Students go for 11 and 12th grades. I think the application cycle opens in the fall but I am not certain.
One of my roommates in college attended Bard at Simon’s Rock for two years and then applied to Havard where she started as a freshman. That was a million years ago, but that might work. I agree that an elite boarding school (or even day) school might provide your daughter the academic challenges she is looking for.
Very helpful, thank you. Considering the financial end, MBU is offering a significant merit scholarship which, in addition to other aid, will bring our annual costs down to around 15K all inclusive. We are neither in a position to consider paying tuition at an elite boarding school, nor would we qualify for much need-based assistance. Locasion is also an important factor: MBU is just 45 minutes from home, which makes it very feasible for us to spend weekends together as a family, which is also a big draw.
I do think that what you say about the capacity of a 14 year old to fully avail herself of the opportunities that exist in a collegiate setting is worth further consideration. Thank you for pointing that out.
And this question of whether a small, regional school will be beneficial or a detriment to her longer term goals is also excellent food for thought.
We have looked at Simon’s Rock, and she’d need to wait another year before applying- she’s just finished her freshman year. My daughter’s current thought is to give MBU a try, and to apply to Simon’s Rock for the following year if it turns out not to be a good fit.
Is it possible to find a top notch high school (public or private) that would challenge your child, or at least keep from being bored? Find a school where a good percentage of the kids attend elite colleges, and she may find her academic peers there.
If finances are a concern, think carefully and take the long view approach to this.
If you are looking for merit money, most merit is given to first time freshmen. There is very little for transfer students.
Why is your child leaving after freshman year? Has she totally exhausted the high school curriculum taking the most rigerous offerings? Personally I vote for dual enrollment. It will give her an opportunity to explore deeper into her interest. As others stated college is both an academic and social experience.
I totally get you wanting your 14 year old home every weekend (me as a parent of a 14 year old would want that to). However, the college parent me would not want my child going away to college with the thought of coming home every weekend. It will cause an additional drawback in her being able to develop relationships in school and a sense of independence/interdependence as a college student.
We also wonder about the implications of coming home weekends- I think that what you say about disrupting her development as an independent college student is worth pondering.
We had also not considered the possibility that she may not be able to take advantage of merit scholarships as a transfer student to another institution later.
It is not the case that my daughter has completely exhausted the high school curriculum. It is the case that even her AP courses seemed to be paced too slowly for her, and she didn’t have the feeling that she was among peers who were as intellectually curious and focused as she, and this was disheartening for her. She tells us that she very much hopes to find a more dynamic learning environment of true peers (not exactly her words, but that’s the gist). We looked at all the private schools here in Charlottesville, and none really sparked her interest. We decided against looking at the one elite prep school in our town- too expensive.
We probably wouldn’t have seriously considered MBU had it not been so close by. My daughter is not really interested in living far from family, and we are not really considering sending her to school out of state. The PEG program really does look quite attractive to us for many reasons, and might be an excellent choice, at least for the coming year.
1 Like
University of Washington has a program which students can start after 8th grade. They do a transition year then go into college around 13 or 14. We looked at it for our now 11th grader. We also talked to many parents who had kids who did the program. All of them regretted it (as parents did not talk to kids). A few examples I can remember…one boy at 19 decided he wanted the freshman experience though he was pretty much done with college and was applying to schools. He technically had no high school diploma so that was an issue. Basically wanted a redo. Other parents reported lots of social problems and unhappiness. Gifted kids have problems fitting in anyway…early college- more reasons not to fit in. Anyway bottom line is we decided not to do it. Socially our D has blossomed in high school. Has had great success in orchestra and really enjoys her AP courses. Is able to handle a really rigorous course load. She is really enjoying sharing the upcoming excitement of senior year, college apps and visits. Early college would have robbed her of this really precious time. I am so glad we did not go that route. When my D was in 8th grade I did think she was a good candidate for early college…I thought she would never be a kid who cared about the social traditions of high school. Turns out she would have missed so much. Really think about it. Kids change and mature in ways we can’t predict.
Do any local schools have the IB diploma? Which APs has she completed that are too slow? Some AP lites for younger students are incomparable to the more solid AP classes. Have you actually contacted the private prep about scholarships? It is more than possible that a very talented student is able to access scholarships. Some schools, like colleges, will buy high stats students. These need to be tangible though, so hopefully you have test scores etc.
She has taken the SAT and completed APs in World History, Computer Science, Biology, and AB Calculus. Our local prep school seems to be very centered on sports, and while they may have more challenging AP courses than those offered at our reasonably good public high school, the school culture is not terribly attractive to our quirky, out-of-the-box, very mature daughter. She was much more intrigued by the school culture of MBU- very diverse, with a down-to-earth feeling and a small cadre of girls who really seemed exactly her type. She got the strong impression that this might be the right social fit for her- we’re just not sure about the academic fit.
Have you consulted with The Davidson Institute? They are an excellent source of information for the PG community.
I have met a few at my LAC.
One was an undergrad classmate who GRADUATED from our respectable LAC with high honors at 17.
He taught English in Japan under the Jet Program for 2 years before starting and completing his PhD in Poli-sci at a top-10 program in his field within 5 years and landing a tenure track position at an elite university.
Another started college as a 14 year old at Simon’s Rock and transferred into our LAC as a 16 year old junior.
Neither of them or others who started college early that I’ve met had problems fitting in, gaining the respect of classmates, benefiting from the academic AND social aspects of college(Especially maintaining good relations with Profs for grad school LORs/job recs), and managing it all without parental input.
In many ways, they were far more mature and capable of managing their college/post college career paths than their older more traditionally aged counterparts.
Only OP knows if her D has the maturity, independence, and self-management abilities to be like the college classmates who started college well before the age of 16.