Graduating college a semester or full year early?

[Anonymous]

Did anyone do this? Was it AP/IB credit or summer work or what that qualified them to graduate early?
And Aside from the obvious fact that a kid would miss part or all of senior year on campus, are there other cons?
How did it work out for your kid?

[Anonymous]

My friend’s daughter did it through heavier course load and summer classes. I think there is regret because she didn’t have the same kind of graduation and she was in a rush to follow a boyfriend. College is such a special time, I would encourage to stay entire time unless miserable.

[Anonymous]

I did it in the mid 1990s with AP credit. Should've stayed the fourth/extra year and gotten a master's.

[Anonymous]

Bad idea unless you are going into non-competitive professional school.

[Anonymous]

DS is doing it, although it wasn't planned. He had about 21 credits of APs, I think, and then will stay for a 1 year masters in a BS/MS program with some courses allowed to doublecount for both degrees. We thought he would finish his BS the 4th year while doing the MS but it will save us like 10,000$ so he says he can finish in the 3rd year (grad students pay by the credit hour and alumni get a 20% discount on tuition).

[Anonymous]

My son considered it (due to combination of HS AP credits, and taking 6 classes each semester), but we discouraged him from graduating early. We can afford the full four years' tuition, and figured this is the only time in his life where he'll have this experience...why rush getting into the work force if he doesn't have to this early. (NOTE: this obviously does not apply to all college students).

So he'll be using the additional time to earn his CPA while an undergrad (he's an accounting major).

[Anonymous]

I would not do it unless you really can't afford that extra semester or extra year.

[Anonymous]

A friend did it with a mix of AP credits and taking the max amount of credits allowed each semester. She stayed until May and worked full time so she could finish out her lease and not miss out on senior year memories. It made sense for her since she was paying her own way.

[Anonymous]

There's no con to "missing" senior year. My friend did this - she took as many AP classes as she could in HS, then took two extra classes each semester. One or two years of summer school. She needed college to cost as little as possible.

[Anonymous]

My DS could have done it but I really didn’t like the idea of missing a whole year of college so I didn’t recommend that he do it. College is a time to learn and grow as a human not just take classes. He ended up double majoring so now he’ll be graduating on time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bad idea unless you are going into non-competitive professional school.

Utterly false. Every year a number of admittees with numerous Governor's School, AP and College courses enter UVA as second-year students. I know several. They graduate in three years and all have moved on to top law schools or MBA or Med school programs. If anything, such initiative is seen as a positive. There are several threads on this topic already here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bad idea unless you are going into non-competitive professional school.

Utterly false. Every year a number of admittees with numerous Governor's School, AP and College courses enter UVA as second-year students. I know several. They graduate in three years and all have moved on to top law schools or MBA or Med school programs. If anything, such initiative is seen as a positive. There are several threads on this topic already here.

+1 Earlier thread on this topic. https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/30/1151313.page

[Anonymous]

My parents joked with me, asking why I didn’t do this.

I reminded them that I would have been 20 graduating college and it didn’t seem worth it to stress myself squeezing in all those classes for that.

As it was, I had barely turned 21 when I walked in my ceremony. I only took a couple academic classes my senior year and mostly stuff for fun - sign language, dance, several music classes, etc. The fun electives completed my credit requirements.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone do this? Was it AP/IB credit or summer work or what that qualified them to graduate early?
And Aside from the obvious fact that a kid would miss part or all of senior year on campus, are there other cons?
How did it work out for your kid?

AP classes for ours and some of their friends. Some of them continued with a one-year masters degree, others jumped into the workforce

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone do this? Was it AP/IB credit or summer work or what that qualified them to graduate early?
And Aside from the obvious fact that a kid would miss part or all of senior year on campus, are there other cons?
How did it work out for your kid?

It depends on what opportunities are there and what your student wants. My super star took full four years, taking courses which were of their professional or personal interest and then went to corporate world to earn big bucks. My average great students graduated early and went to grad schools.