Poll: What age will your children be when they graduate from high school? What age did you graduate?

[IfIOnly]

I'm not sure why I haven't figured this out before, but my two oldest will be 17 when they graduate.  My oldest with an early August birthday will turn 18 with two months after graduation, and my second oldest with a late November birthday will turn 18 six months after he graduates.  That seems so young to me!   Especially since they will be doing dual enrollment their junior and senior years of high school.  :/   On the other hand, I graduated high school on the later side at 19 (repeated my freshman year...long story).  I'd love to have your input on the poll and hear your thoughts on this topic. Thank you!

 

ETA. I think you can choose more than one answer on the poll if your dc have varying graduation ages.

 

[elegantlion]

Ds has a fall birthday and will be 18 most of his senior year. 

 

I was 17 when I graduated, technically I graduated at semester my senior year and have a late spring birthday. I would have turned 18 the last month of school if I'd finished out the year. 

 

Ds was in private school for prek and K and we used their age cutoffs. 

[CrunchyGirl]

LegoMan and ArtsyGirl will graduate a month before they turn 18. Assuming The Monkey stars at 5 she will turn 18 six weeks after graduation.

[Walking-Iris]

My two youngest are summer birthdays, and so could be 17 at graduation. My oldest will be 18 due to being a winter birthday. I was 18--winter birthday. Honestly I don't think it matters. In public school the majority are 17,18 their senior year. But in a homeschool situation, you can do this earlier, or even a year later. I don't personally feel there is anything magical about 12 years of education, or being 18, that suddenly means a child is an adult, or ready for college, or "done."

 

I personally feel that there needs to be another year of middle school. Call it 5th grade part 2, or 8th grade part 2. LOL. But I don't feel that some teens are exactly ready for the next thing at 17 or 18 years old. Some could use more time.

 

 

[Butter]

I was homeschooled.  I got my GED (the college required it back then so I could go full time) either right before or right after I turned 17.  I picked 17, but I may have still been 16.  My daughter will turn 17 in February of her senior year.  My little guys will be 17, turning 18 June and July after they finish 12th grade.  My oldest son will be 18 near the beginning of his senior year.

[musicianmom]

I was 16, my summer birthday kids will be 17, and my December birthday child will be 18.

[Laura Corin]

Calvin just left school at 17 1/2.  Hobbes will be just turned 18.

 

L

[Kelly1730]

The twins will be 18 when they graduate, May 2020, but will turn 19 in July. I was 17 when I graduated, turned 18 in July. 

[Crimson Wife]

My oldest (October birthday) will be 17 if we don't add a "transition" year to middle school, 18 if we do.

 

My 2nd (November birthday) did a "transition" year between K & 1st, so he will be 18.

 

My 3rd (January birthday) will be 18 if she doesn't repeat any grades, 19 if she does. As a special ed student, she can attend high school through age 21 if necessary, though I don't anticipate that it will take her that long to finish high school.

[AimeeM]

We are adding a year to middle school for my oldest, so she will be 18 when she graduates (August birthday).

 

My middle son, assuming we do not do the same, will be 17, as will our youngest.

[creekland]

I was 17 because I had an August birthday and graduated before it.

 

My three boys will be 18 because all of their birthdays fall during the school year.

 

All of us are/were considered "normal" the difference being merely when our birthdays came.  No one was held back or started/finished early.

[Ellie]

If my dc had been in school, they would have had their 18th bdays in May, then graduated in June. We graduated them on their 16th birthdays. :-)

 

I graduated in June, was 18 in July.

[SKL]

Interesting that the trend so far has parents, on average, graduating younger than their kids.

 

I was 16 at graduation (October birthday) because I started school early and graduated an additional year early.

 

My kids will be 17 when they graduate, if all goes according to plan.  One has an October birthday, the other a January birthday.

 

I am not worried about the younger age.  It was not a problem for me to be 16 starting college.  There are options if going away to college is not right for your kid at that age.

[Alice]

Mine will all be 17 unless something changes, they all have fall birthdays. 

 

I was 17, my birthday is in February. 

[Rachel]

I had a summer birthday so I graduated high school at 17. I could have graduated at 16 but chose not to. Instead I attended high school part time and took college classes at the local university.

 

My older two have fall/winter birthdays so they will graduate at 18. My youngest has a summer birthday and since we are homeschooling he will start official schooling shortly after he turns 5. He will therefore graduate at 17, he's almost 2 so that's only if everything goes according to plan.

[shinyhappypeople]

I was 17, younger DD will probably be 18 and older DD will probably be 17, based on school cut-off dates.

 

I think the general trend to redshirt some kids for kindergarten will mean that graduating seniors will skew older than when I was in school in the 80s.  It's not really a big deal, though.   I wish I'd redshirted older DD, instead of enrolling her in public K at 4 yo (Sept. b/day).  It would make her 18 when she graduates, but since the local schools have eliminated kindergarten and start 5 year old in first grade*, it would have been the kinder choice.

 

*Not literally eliminated.  They still call it K.  It just has more in common with traditional first grade than with traditional kindergarten.

[Crimson Wife]

Cutoffs are way earlier than they used to be. When I was a kid, as long as the child was 5 by December 31st, he/she could start K. When my older kids were starting, the cutoff was December 2nd. By the time my youngest starts this year, the state had moved the cutoff to September 1st.

[wapiti]

FWIW, there have been a couple of polls on the high school board:

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/504355-how-old-will-your-sons-be-when-hethey-graduate/

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/516205-how-old-will-your-son-bewas-your-son-when-he-graduatesed/

 

Three of my kids will be 18 at graduation and three will turn 18 near or after graduation but before going off to college.

[EKS]

My older son just graduated right before he turned 18.  The younger one skipped two grades at his b&m school.  If we don't undo the skip, he will graduate at 16. 

[Ellie]

Interesting that the trend so far has parents, on average, graduating younger than their kids.

 

I was 16 at graduation (October birthday) because I started school early and graduated an additional year early.

 

My kids will be 17 when they graduate, if all goes according to plan.  One has an October birthday, the other a January birthday.

 

I am not worried about the younger age.  It was not a problem for me to be 16 starting college.  There are options if going away to college is not right for your kid at that age.

 

:iagree: 

 

High school graduation should be about completing a course of study, not a commentary on maturity.

[creekland]

I am not worried about the younger age.  It was not a problem for me to be 16 starting college.  There are options if going away to college is not right for your kid at that age.

 

Just another option... with homeschooling one can also work far more depth into "high school" including college classes at community college or 4 year schools.  This allows the student to remain with their peers age-wise - something I've seen MANY prefer (but not all, of course).  Those I've seen IRL who head off to college a bit younger than their peers often return not particularly liking the "life" experience even if they enjoyed the study/academic aspect.

 

For the parent (guidance counselor) of these students, it is well worth it to think long and hard about the individual and their plans + personality.  In public school, options are often (not always) limited so kids could "top out" way too early and not feel they fit in academically or socially.  With homeschooling, there are so many more options to consider.

[73349]

I was 17 (Dec. birthday, Dec. 31 cutoff); DH was 18 (Nov. birthday, Oct. 1 cutoff); DS will most likely be 18 (Jan. birthday, August cutoff if he were in PS, I believe).

[Loowit]

I was 18 when I graduated, but there were a number of classmates including my best friend who were 17.  DH had a summer birthday and was 17.

 

DD and my younger DS will be 17 if we continue like we have been.  Middle boy will be 18.  I am considering adding a transition year for my youngest between middle school and high school, but we will see.

[AngelaNYC]

Both my girls were/are 17 - with late November and early August birthdays.  I was 17 as well (September birthday).  Here in NYC, seniors graduate at 18 if they have birthdays between January and June or 17 if they have birthdays from June to December 31 after senior year (very late cutoff here).  

 

Ds will be 18 since he has a March birthday.

[Clear Creek]

I have a Nov. birthday, so I graduated the summer before I turned 18. My oldest will turn 18 the summer after she graduates, and my two younger will turn 18 the winter/spring before they graduate.

 

Funny story about myself - my freshman year of college was an election year (not presidential), so the weeks leading up to the election there were students going through the residence halls making sure all the students were registered to vote and encouraging them to all vote on election day. I had some poor guy just flabbergasted that I was not registered to vote and had no plans to register to vote before the election; nothing he said could change my mind on the matter. I finally let him off the hook and told him I wasn't old enough to vote yet :lol:  He was quite surprised to find a 17 yo student living on campus.

[Murphy101]

It's always fluctuated from 17-19 here as far as I and our parents remember.

 

Dh was 17, I was 18, we had friends that were 19, 18, and 17.

 

It just depended on where your birthday landed and whether your parents enrolled you ASAP after we turned 5 or 6 or 7 (some states don't mandate starting until age 7) Dh is a June baby, who started school the September after his 5th birthday. I'm an October baby who started the September after I turned 6, (thus I was a month shy of 7years old) so even tho we were born the same year and 3 months apart, dh graduated when I was still a junior in high school.

 

For our kids, they graduated at 18 and 19 so far. We have also seen the 17-19 spread for their classes, both home schooled or public/private schooled.

[NASDAQ]

Assuming no acceleration, two will be barely 18, one almost 18, and two six months shy of 18 (b. nov and oct)

[MistyMountain]

My kids will be 18 but nearing 19 when they graduate and will turn 19 shortly after starting college. I don't like that they will be so old but they were not ready for the new higher standards of kindergarten and 1st earlier and they have fall birthdays past the cut off. I was a January birthday so I was 18 at graduation. If I start homeschooling I would let them take college classes earlier.

[silverdl]

Adjusted our oldest's grade level after completing 9th (officially had her in 9th again the next year) because she has a Jan birthday and would be so young when she graduated.  Best thing we ever did.  She's half way through college now.  Did it with our next as well due to an Oct birthday.  He graduates next year.  Both were/will be 18 at graduation.

 

[SkateLeft]

.

[texasmama]

If my kids continue on the path they are currently, two will graduate at age 18 and one will graduate at age 16.  Their  high school experience will include some DE classes at the CC so this blurs the lines between high school and college, IMO.  In fact, I anticipate a gradual transition from mom-led/co-op classes to community college to four year college.  

 

The kid who is on track to graduate at age 16 is very driven, and this is his plan.  He knows that he can change this plan at any point based on his needs.  We are very fortunate to have a solid CC system in our county.  If this kid wants to attend CC classes earlier than age 16, I will look into this possibility for him.

 

I graduated at age 18, which was "on track" for my January bday.  My older dd graduated private school at age 17 and turned 18 the July following her graduation.  She has done just fine at a four year college living in the dorm.

[basketcase]

This is a topic of discussion at our house occasionally - my husband kind of skipped the whole high school thing, never graduated. (He graduated from college at 18.) I was 18 when I graduated from high school. I don't really care when my kids are done with high school, but I have real concerns about them leaving home too early. I have a few more years to worry about it.

[Erin]

Assuming no early graduations, my kids will both be 18.  Bean has a November birthday and Buck's is in February, so they'll both be 18 for their May graduations.  

I have a July birthday, OTOH, so I was 17 when I graduated.  An easy 25% of my class was too, actually.

[swellmomma]

I turned 18 2 weeks after our graduation ceremony but technically didn't finish 12th grade until 2 weeks later.
based on current trajectory.  Hoping to graduate him at 18 but think he will need another year, dang LDs. if he graduates at 18 he will turn 19 2 months later, if at 19 he will turn 20 2 months later.

dd14 will be 17 when she graduates and turn 18 a month later.

ds10 who knows, with his LDs he could be another one that is 19 when he finally does.

dd6 if she stays on track will be 17 when she graduates and turn 18 3 months later.

[Luanne]

Well, when I went to school, we had to follow the cut-off date to a T.  It was September 15.  My sister, oldest brother, and I were all 18 when we graduated.  My brother with a Sept. 2 birthday, graduated at 17.  My parents tried to have the Sept. 2 brother held back in 1st grade, but the school refused claiming they would damage his ego if they held him back.  He struggled ALL the way through school and was probably more damaged than if they had held him back.

 

My daughter was 18, because like my sister and I, she has a fall birthday, but past the Sept. 15 cut-off.

[boscopup]

I turned 18 shortly before graduation.

 

My first and third kids will turn 18 shortly after graduation. My second kid will be 18 most of his senior year, as he was born a couple months after the cutoff.

 

I would expect a kid to be 17 (summer birthday) or 18 at graduation. They'd only be 19 if they were redshirted or held back a grade.

[RootAnn]

I fit the trend that I graduated younger than any of my dc probably will, but like some of the PP, I'm unsure when mine will graduate due to possible additions of a "transition year" to some or all of the kids' education. I chose 17 for me & 17-18 for my kids. It is possible that my boys will graduate at almost-19, however.

[Farrar]

Mine will be 17, not quite 18, as was I.

 

I intend to strongly encourage/strongarm/suggest a gap year.  I have always believed that would be best and hearing SWB speak about how that was one of the things she believed in really solidified that for me.  Though I will say that the gap year is a belief I have aside from my boys being on the young end for grade.

[candicane]

I don't have kids, but I thought I'd offer it up anyways. I was 17 when I graduated then turned 18 in Sept, but it never bothered me to be younger than most of my classmates (they were 18 or 19).

[Korrale]

I am Australian and it was pretty much the norm to graduate at 17. The very few people I know that graduated at 18 only did so because they repeated a year.

My American husband graduated when he had just turned 19. Not unusual apparently. It is just odd to be a legal adult and in school to me. I was asking him about truancy and things like that. And if parents had to still sign permission slips.

[Cricket]

I am Australian and it was pretty much the norm to graduate at 17. The very few people I know that graduated at 18 only did so because they repeated a year.

My American husband graduated when he had just turned 19. Not unusual apparently. It is just odd to be a legal adult and in school to me. I was asking him about truancy and things like that. And if parents had to still sign permission slips.

 

One of my classmates was married with a baby.  He turned 18 sometime during his senior year and had gotten his girlfriend pregnant.  They were married before the end of the school year.  It was really weird to me! 

[Lieutenant Stranger]

I was 18.5 (to be exact). One of my kids will be 18 and the other will "graduate" right before 19.

[Mommy22alyns]

The girls will be 18 by three months.  I was 17, but I turned 18 just a couple of weeks later.

[TracyP]

All five of my kids will be 18. One will be just turned 18, and the rest will be between 18 1/2-18 3/4.

 

Except, I have been thinking about this:

My American husband graduated when he had just turned 19. Not unusual apparently. It is just odd to be a legal adult and in school to me. I was asking him about truancy and things like that. And if parents had to still sign permission slips.

 

I have been wondering if a couple of my kids would be better off graduating a year earlier. Academically it would not be a problem, but the momma in me wants to keep them forever. ;) When I was 17, I was in college, living on my own, and supporting myself financially. I was SO ready to move on. I can't imagine waiting a year longer - I would have liked to move out a year earlier. My oldest is just like me..... so I haven't decided yet.

[DragonFaerie]

DD will most likely graduate at 16, but she has skipped two grade levels.  DS is more typical and will graduate at 18 (February birthday).  I graduated at 17 due to a summer birthday.

[happypamama]

DH and I graduated one month and two months after we turned 18. Our first two children will turn 18 3 and 4 months before they graduate. Our middle child will turn 19 a few months after he graduates, as he's a fall birthday. If I had planned to send him to public school, I'd have sent him last year, just before he turned 5, because he was socially and academically ready. But we wanted to keep him home anyway, and when given the choice, he wanted to call himself a preschooler last year and a kindergartener this year. It's possible he may skip a grade in there somewhere and end up graduating a few months before he turns 18. I am not entirely sure about our fourth and fifth children; they have summer birthdays and so will be very new 5s when they start kindergarten, so I suppose they will graduate just before they turn 18, unless we decide to start them late or something, like when they are newly 6.

[Jackie]

I was 17 years 6 months. At the little liberal arts college I attended, a majority of the students had graduated high school early and began college at 16 or 17 years old.

 

I voted other for DD because she is too young to tell right now. DH and I are open to early graduation and early college entrance if it is right for her.

[Joker]

With my siblings, two of us were 18 and two of us were 17. The difference was two winter birthdays and two summer birthdays. It is the same with my dds. One will be 18 and the other 17 at graduation.

[IsabelC]

I started university at 17, and I think that was too young. My kids, well I have no idea as yet what their further education plans are going to look like, or whether they will take a gap/work year, so it's hard to know. It's going to depend on how they go in the meantime and what aspirations they have.

[MinivanMom]

For my kids: 1 will be 17 and the other 4 will be 18 when they graduate high school. They will all be 18 by the time they start college. I have never heard of a 19-yr-old high school graduate except on these boards.

 

I graduated and started college at 17 back when the cutoff in California was Dec.31. I went out-of-state for college, but fully half of the girls on my dorm floor were still 17, and it was not a big deal at all. In fact, my (highly anecdotal) experience was that the 17-yr-olds seemed to be the most mature and serious students; it was those kids who started college as old 18-yr-olds that seemed to really struggle (and a few dropped out or transferred back to their state U so they could move back home). I'm not sure that it was caused by their age. Perhaps their parents were more willing to let a naturally mature and academically oriented child be the youngest in their grade, while parents of children who were less mature or already struggling were more likely to want their child to be older when they left home. I didn't know any incoming freshman who were older than 18.