4 is the new 5

How many people have heard this conversation amongst a group of mothers?

Mom A: My Bobby is so smart, I think I’m gonna start him in Kindergarten a year early.
Mom B: Oh yeah, well I read Baby Shakespeare to my Sally every night. She’s only three but I think she’s ready to start school right now!
Mom A: Our children are soooo smart, let’s go tanning!

Depending on the school district, the minimum age requirement for a child to enroll in kindergarten is between four and five years old. It seems that the current trend is motivated toward pushing the age even younger, as parents fight to have their “gifted and talented” children swept up into the machine as soon as possible. I’m not sure if this motivation stems from a selfish root or if parents truly believe that the geniuses on their hands need to learn colors as soon as possible. Either way, I think it’s just the beginning of a dangerously archaic process.

Our age/grade scale was developed for a society that no longer exists. I believe the system was originally set up to get young adults into the workplace sooner than later. Even thirty years ago, it was far less common for students to continue their education beyond high school. The problem today is that we are graduating our students too soon. The average seventeen or eighteen year-old is not mentally, emotionally or socially ready for a serious position in the working world, much less to be a college student.

It’s no secret that kids are growing up faster and faster these days, but our school systems are really doing nothing to help. Starting at around age 15, high school kids are put in the position to make decisions that will seriously affect their life’s trajectory. Given the chance to do it all again, I know I would have wanted to been a few years older before having choices of that magnitude on my dinner plate. I was fairly mature for my age but I was in no position to make life altering decisions. How many high school students can answer the big “what do you want to do with your life” question? I don’t think most college students can answer that question with certainty.

The answer to this madness? From my perspective we have one of two options. We can either begin the government regulated academic career at least two years later, or add two years to the high school experience. Freshmen and Sophomore years of college are often referred to as the 13th and 14th grade as it is, why not tack that on to high school? It is far too common for young adults to wake up in their mid-twenties with the notion that they’ve made irrevocable decisions that they’d give anything to change. It all seems silly when you think about it. We have 18 years of childhood to figure out how were going to spend the next 50 or 60 years of adulthood. What’s the rush?