How to “redshirt” in DC?

[Anonymous]

We had our Sep 9th bday daughter do prek 3, prek 4 in DCPS and then move to private (which had been our plan all along). She repeated prek 4 in private. She is one of the oldest in her class now and it's much better for her. I agree that being older is an advantage and we bought it for our child. I explored doing it through DCPS and was totally shut down.

[Anonymous]

We actually met with the (extremely nice) principle at Murch the spring before DS turned 5 (August 26th birthday). The short version was that he would start in kindergarten and if he seemed to be struggling they would move him to pre-k the first week or so. If he wasn’t, he would stay.

Based on that, we kept him at private preschool for another year. He’s now going into 6th and we remain very happy with our decision.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You don’t know where your kid will be, OP.

My older son is VERY young for his chronological age, and even though he’s on the older end of the grade, was on the lower end for maturity. I was so worried about him starting PK and in fact even a couple months before, he would not have really been ready.

My daughter is a late August birthday. She’ll start PK right around her 3rd birthday next month. She could have started six months ago. Seriously.

Kids are different. Your kid is one. Give it time, stop borrowing trouble.

Oh and I’ll say this - literally every single kid in my kids PK3 class was born in between the cut offs. Two kids turned 3 the first month of school. It all worked out.

Exactly this. You do not need to make this decision yet. Don’t assume your kid will be at a disadvantage being the youngest. And as PP says, there will be plenty of near-the-cut-off kids; your daughter will not be the only one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

I'm really glad you had a good experience. I feel like there's no truly optimum option for my kid with a summer birthday. She's super smart but shy and a little anxious. Redshirting didn't feel like it made sense because she was academically very ready for kindergarten and already reading on her own. But socially and emotionally I do think she could have used another year of preschool -- she's probably socio-emotionally a bit immature for her age and when you throw in being youngest that starts to look really obvious. So it didn't feel like any solution was an obvious choice.

DC ties your hands. I guess we could have tried to redshirt her in PK but at that time it didn't occur to us -- she was 3 and seemed about as mature as other 3 yr olds at the time. It wasn't until the summer before K that we started to see the merit in another year of PK but by then she was in the system "on time" and was clearly academically ready.

It is what it is. We do our best to support her and give her what she needs. Some teachers are better than others both in terms of providing appropriate academic challenge and recognizing that she is a little behind other kids in stuff like emotional regulation. I'm sure it's not easy for them either.

If we could afford private I'd probably just do that because it's probably the only way to get her what she really needs both academically and socio-emotionally. But we can't so here we are.

[Anonymous]

We redshirted a September birthday for DCPS PK.

I never regretted it. We ended up moving to a top private for high school and those schools have a Sept 1 cut-off and many summer birthdays are held back. As a Sept birthday, our kid was probably at the 70% for age in the class.
He graduated last year top 10% in the grade, perfect SAT, socially very strong (an incredible friend group), leader, went on to an Ivy.
Sure, maybe he would have been the exact same outcome if he went to school a year earlier but in our experience there was ZERO downside to waiting.

Also---I am SO, SO grateful for having another year with the kid at home. 17-18 years go by so quickly. Kids have their lifetime to be an adult, work, etc. The years at home are incredibly short.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

I'm really glad you had a good experience. I feel like there's no truly optimum option for my kid with a summer birthday. She's super smart but shy and a little anxious. Redshirting didn't feel like it made sense because she was academically very ready for kindergarten and already reading on her own. But socially and emotionally I do think she could have used another year of preschool -- she's probably socio-emotionally a bit immature for her age and when you throw in being youngest that starts to look really obvious. So it didn't feel like any solution was an obvious choice.

DC ties your hands. I guess we could have tried to redshirt her in PK but at that time it didn't occur to us -- she was 3 and seemed about as mature as other 3 yr olds at the time. It wasn't until the summer before K that we started to see the merit in another year of PK but by then she was in the system "on time" and was clearly academically ready.

It is what it is. We do our best to support her and give her what she needs. Some teachers are better than others both in terms of providing appropriate academic challenge and recognizing that she is a little behind other kids in stuff like emotional regulation. I'm sure it's not easy for them either.

If we could afford private I'd probably just do that because it's probably the only way to get her what she really needs both academically and socio-emotionally. But we can't so here we are.

My kid has a mid-September birthday who is not redshirted. This past year if it was possible to have a class with one grade lower levels of social and emotional support and a grade accelerated academic work (I.e. K level staffing with 2nd grade content) it would be ideal. Thankfully our 1st grade teacher was awesome and worked a lot on social-emotional growth with them. We accept that no collective system can ever be ideal in every instance and every way and just make the best of it. If they were not academically ready then I think we would have a better argument to redshirt.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

I'm really glad you had a good experience. I feel like there's no truly optimum option for my kid with a summer birthday. She's super smart but shy and a little anxious. Redshirting didn't feel like it made sense because she was academically very ready for kindergarten and already reading on her own. But socially and emotionally I do think she could have used another year of preschool -- she's probably socio-emotionally a bit immature for her age and when you throw in being youngest that starts to look really obvious. So it didn't feel like any solution was an obvious choice.

DC ties your hands. I guess we could have tried to redshirt her in PK but at that time it didn't occur to us -- she was 3 and seemed about as mature as other 3 yr olds at the time. It wasn't until the summer before K that we started to see the merit in another year of PK but by then she was in the system "on time" and was clearly academically ready.

It is what it is. We do our best to support her and give her what she needs. Some teachers are better than others both in terms of providing appropriate academic challenge and recognizing that she is a little behind other kids in stuff like emotional regulation. I'm sure it's not easy for them either.

If we could afford private I'd probably just do that because it's probably the only way to get her what she really needs both academically and socio-emotionally. But we can't so here we are.

Just throwing this out there - redshirting won’t necessarily be great for your kid. Even a kid who doesn’t have a late birthday in the cohort can struggle. I have a December baby who was one of the oldest in her class, one of the most academically advanced, but she found it hard to manage socio-emotionally. She came from daycare/private preschool so it’s not a matter of setting, it’s DCPS or individual teacher. Her PK and K teachers worked with her. Her first grade teacher was horrible about it (literally no communication even when the principals tried to require it). So even if you redshirted an August or September kiddo, especially if you have reason to believe they need the extra time for skills/social reasons, not going to guarantee they won’t struggle. So if anyone is stressed about it, I recommend just going with the flow and supplementing/advocating. That’s life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

This is also our experience. I have 2 boys with Aug & Sept bdays. Both are ahead of their peers academically and would be miserable if we had redshirted. On is in MS now but taking HS math classes and the other will finish ES this year above grade on all subjects.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

I'm really glad you had a good experience. I feel like there's no truly optimum option for my kid with a summer birthday. She's super smart but shy and a little anxious. Redshirting didn't feel like it made sense because she was academically very ready for kindergarten and already reading on her own. But socially and emotionally I do think she could have used another year of preschool -- she's probably socio-emotionally a bit immature for her age and when you throw in being youngest that starts to look really obvious. So it didn't feel like any solution was an obvious choice.

DC ties your hands. I guess we could have tried to redshirt her in PK but at that time it didn't occur to us -- she was 3 and seemed about as mature as other 3 yr olds at the time. It wasn't until the summer before K that we started to see the merit in another year of PK but by then she was in the system "on time" and was clearly academically ready.

It is what it is. We do our best to support her and give her what she needs. Some teachers are better than others both in terms of providing appropriate academic challenge and recognizing that she is a little behind other kids in stuff like emotional regulation. I'm sure it's not easy for them either.

If we could afford private I'd probably just do that because it's probably the only way to get her what she really needs both academically and socio-emotionally. But we can't so here we are.

My kid has a mid-September birthday who is not redshirted. This past year if it was possible to have a class with one grade lower levels of social and emotional support and a grade accelerated academic work (I.e. K level staffing with 2nd grade content) it would be ideal. Thankfully our 1st grade teacher was awesome and worked a lot on social-emotional growth with them. We accept that no collective system can ever be ideal in every instance and every way and just make the best of it. If they were not academically ready then I think we would have a better argument to redshirt.

This is of course true and also gets to the heart of why parents redshirt and why it's such a hot button topic for some: it is hard to watch your kid struggle. You want to set them up for success. Redshirting feels like a concrete thing you can give them -- an extra year of preparation.

But also watching your kid struggle sometimes is inevitable and redshirting won't change that. Struggle is learning. Learning is the point.

[Anonymous]

I don’t mind the dcps cutoff but really resent how fast and loose the privates are with this. I have an April who is the youngest in his class and likely always will be. We are considering dcps for several reasons including that he won’t be the youngest anymore

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

I'm really glad you had a good experience. I feel like there's no truly optimum option for my kid with a summer birthday. She's super smart but shy and a little anxious. Redshirting didn't feel like it made sense because she was academically very ready for kindergarten and already reading on her own. But socially and emotionally I do think she could have used another year of preschool -- she's probably socio-emotionally a bit immature for her age and when you throw in being youngest that starts to look really obvious. So it didn't feel like any solution was an obvious choice.

DC ties your hands. I guess we could have tried to redshirt her in PK but at that time it didn't occur to us -- she was 3 and seemed about as mature as other 3 yr olds at the time. It wasn't until the summer before K that we started to see the merit in another year of PK but by then she was in the system "on time" and was clearly academically ready.

It is what it is. We do our best to support her and give her what she needs. Some teachers are better than others both in terms of providing appropriate academic challenge and recognizing that she is a little behind other kids in stuff like emotional regulation. I'm sure it's not easy for them either.

If we could afford private I'd probably just do that because it's probably the only way to get her what she really needs both academically and socio-emotionally. But we can't so here we are.

Just throwing this out there - redshirting won’t necessarily be great for your kid. Even a kid who doesn’t have a late birthday in the cohort can struggle. I have a December baby who was one of the oldest in her class, one of the most academically advanced, but she found it hard to manage socio-emotionally. She came from daycare/private preschool so it’s not a matter of setting, it’s DCPS or individual teacher. Her PK and K teachers worked with her. Her first grade teacher was horrible about it (literally no communication even when the principals tried to require it). So even if you redshirted an August or September kiddo, especially if you have reason to believe they need the extra time for skills/social reasons, not going to guarantee they won’t struggle. So if anyone is stressed about it, I recommend just going with the flow and supplementing/advocating. That’s life.

This is all very dismissive. Your daughter was one of the oldest in her class and struggled. Now imagine if she was pushed forward a year with the same maturity. What would that have looked like? Yeah. Welcome to what my September kid experienced. She was the absolute youngest in her grade (1 day before the cutoff) AND very immature. She was still 4 yo at the beginning of kindergarten and ended up being removed from the classroom daily and sent to the principal's office. It was a disaster. The complaints were things like being so wiggly she'd fall over in her chair, dropping her pencil too many times, grumping and refusing to sit when she didn't get her favorite spot on the rug, disturbing others with talking, etc. She started refusing school and eloping. She didn't trust teachers and had tons of anxiety about speaking to a teacher. It's been years now and she has no issues other than being immature for her age, though it took years to recover from her terrible start in public school. A redshirted year would have made a huge difference for her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

I'm really glad you had a good experience. I feel like there's no truly optimum option for my kid with a summer birthday. She's super smart but shy and a little anxious. Redshirting didn't feel like it made sense because she was academically very ready for kindergarten and already reading on her own. But socially and emotionally I do think she could have used another year of preschool -- she's probably socio-emotionally a bit immature for her age and when you throw in being youngest that starts to look really obvious. So it didn't feel like any solution was an obvious choice.

DC ties your hands. I guess we could have tried to redshirt her in PK but at that time it didn't occur to us -- she was 3 and seemed about as mature as other 3 yr olds at the time. It wasn't until the summer before K that we started to see the merit in another year of PK but by then she was in the system "on time" and was clearly academically ready.

It is what it is. We do our best to support her and give her what she needs. Some teachers are better than others both in terms of providing appropriate academic challenge and recognizing that she is a little behind other kids in stuff like emotional regulation. I'm sure it's not easy for them either.

If we could afford private I'd probably just do that because it's probably the only way to get her what she really needs both academically and socio-emotionally. But we can't so here we are.

My kid has a mid-September birthday who is not redshirted. This past year if it was possible to have a class with one grade lower levels of social and emotional support and a grade accelerated academic work (I.e. K level staffing with 2nd grade content) it would be ideal. Thankfully our 1st grade teacher was awesome and worked a lot on social-emotional growth with them. We accept that no collective system can ever be ideal in every instance and every way and just make the best of it. If they were not academically ready then I think we would have a better argument to redshirt.

This is of course true and also gets to the heart of why parents redshirt and why it's such a hot button topic for some: it is hard to watch your kid struggle. You want to set them up for success. Redshirting feels like a concrete thing you can give them -- an extra year of preparation.

But also watching your kid struggle sometimes is inevitable and redshirting won't change that. Struggle is learning. Learning is the point.

This. Engineering your kids experience is not real life and struggling and learning to control and overcome is a part of growing up.

Redshirting is giving your kid an artificial advantage. That’s not how life works. If you kid is socially immature,work with them to improve that and if things don’t improve, consider an underlying issue of why that is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid (boy) is a late September birthday and the top of his class academically. You have no way to tell at 1 how your kid is going to be in school…

+1. It would have been a disaster if we redshirted DS who would be so bored.

My bday is in Sept and I was always the youngest in the class. No issues. Did very well in school when I started and all subsequent years.

I'm really glad you had a good experience. I feel like there's no truly optimum option for my kid with a summer birthday. She's super smart but shy and a little anxious. Redshirting didn't feel like it made sense because she was academically very ready for kindergarten and already reading on her own. But socially and emotionally I do think she could have used another year of preschool -- she's probably socio-emotionally a bit immature for her age and when you throw in being youngest that starts to look really obvious. So it didn't feel like any solution was an obvious choice.

DC ties your hands. I guess we could have tried to redshirt her in PK but at that time it didn't occur to us -- she was 3 and seemed about as mature as other 3 yr olds at the time. It wasn't until the summer before K that we started to see the merit in another year of PK but by then she was in the system "on time" and was clearly academically ready.

It is what it is. We do our best to support her and give her what she needs. Some teachers are better than others both in terms of providing appropriate academic challenge and recognizing that she is a little behind other kids in stuff like emotional regulation. I'm sure it's not easy for them either.

If we could afford private I'd probably just do that because it's probably the only way to get her what she really needs both academically and socio-emotionally. But we can't so here we are.

Just throwing this out there - redshirting won’t necessarily be great for your kid. Even a kid who doesn’t have a late birthday in the cohort can struggle. I have a December baby who was one of the oldest in her class, one of the most academically advanced, but she found it hard to manage socio-emotionally. She came from daycare/private preschool so it’s not a matter of setting, it’s DCPS or individual teacher. Her PK and K teachers worked with her. Her first grade teacher was horrible about it (literally no communication even when the principals tried to require it). So even if you redshirted an August or September kiddo, especially if you have reason to believe they need the extra time for skills/social reasons, not going to guarantee they won’t struggle. So if anyone is stressed about it, I recommend just going with the flow and supplementing/advocating. That’s life.

This is all very dismissive. Your daughter was one of the oldest in her class and struggled. Now imagine if she was pushed forward a year with the same maturity. What would that have looked like? Yeah. Welcome to what my September kid experienced. She was the absolute youngest in her grade (1 day before the cutoff) AND very immature. She was still 4 yo at the beginning of kindergarten and ended up being removed from the classroom daily and sent to the principal's office. It was a disaster. The complaints were things like being so wiggly she'd fall over in her chair, dropping her pencil too many times, grumping and refusing to sit when she didn't get her favorite spot on the rug, disturbing others with talking, etc. She started refusing school and eloping. She didn't trust teachers and had tons of anxiety about speaking to a teacher. It's been years now and she has no issues other than being immature for her age, though it took years to recover from her terrible start in public school. A redshirted year would have made a huge difference for her.

You may think so but don’t know for sure. Could be the same outcome. Could be she needed a few years to mature.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't listen to these people --- my son has a 9/24 birthday -- I "resshirted" him, best decision I ever made. When you go to enter the lottery for prek3 in myschooldc a pop up will appear that says "are you sure you don't mean prek4" , you will say yes and then you will never be asked or think about it again...

the end.

Yes, same here. You just override the pop-up.

We redshirted twins for PK4.

Wow, does this actually work?