My son's kindergarten class has several 7 yr olds in it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree "redshirt" is derogatory. I've met parents with summer birthday children who were held back just refer to them generally as "holdbacks." That's probably a more accurate and less loaded term, although perhaps a little more cumbersome and less flashy than referring to them as "redshirts."

To me, this discussion over terminology sort of mirrors the debate over "Big 3." That term also is loaded, unfair, perhaps inaccurate. But it's a handy term for discussions since people know exactly what you mean.

A more appropriate term for redshirt could be a "shouldabeen". As in, "That Kindergartener "shouldabeen" a 1st grader but his Dad wants him to play football in high school.

[Anonymous]

This was the longstanding WASP formula to get their kids to school Senior Prefect, Ivy, Wall Street and the Secret Service.

In a nutshell: a common practice (redshirting) well entrenched along the Boston and New York corridors of WASP power and high society social registry only now is trickling down to the plebs in the D.C. area private schools from the commotion in these Boards.

For centuries this practice was the common formula (and it still remains) to gain competitive advantage in exclusive NE prep schools (farm teams) ...leading to team captaincy, school leadership, lead in the annual school play and a move up to the Big Ivy Leagues where "Skull and Bone" societies and fancy eating clubs awaited before strutting onto the stages of power in America.

The underlying motives in D.C. are largely no different from yesteryear; despite the fact, in the long run, redshirts (particularly at the ages of 5,6, and 7) are no more smarter, more athletic or more charismatic than all the rest.

[Anonymous]

Please don't respond or engage 09:19.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
The motives behind, hold back, redshirt, or whatever sugarcoating you wish appear the same for many -- an attempt by some to gain a competitive advantage in the classroom or the gridiron -- before K or 9th grade or College.

No use hiding behind semantic smoke.

Well said!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Makes my blood boil when a parent justifies her decision to redshirt by stating she will worry about her kids and I should worry about my own. That's the same logic used by the crazies who don't vaccinate their kids despite the health risk it poses to everyone else.

What risk does a summer birthday holdback pose to everyone else's children? What risk does a Mar-May holdback create? How about a Jan-Feb holdback? Does these older children carry smallpox or something?!?

[Anonymous]

When everyone redshirts, then it is sort of like the joke being played on the kids who didn't. There is little, if any concern for summer redshirting. It is the Spring redshirting where people have issues.

There was another thread on this a while back where someone used the phrase "pre-flunk", as in the parents didn't have enough faith that their kid could hack Kindergarten so they pre-flunked them for the school. The pro-redshirting crowd didn't like that very much either. I guess if they cannot see the optics and reality of it, they should be thick skinned enough to see the ramifications in the classroom and on message boards.

[Anonymous]

The only major and material impact of redshirting on other K children is in the hallucinating minds of neurotic parents.

[Anonymous]

Hallucinating heads with their boiling blood!

[Anonymous]

All ass, not hat.

[Anonymous]

How about "delayed kindergarten entrance". Descriptive, non-pejorative, and doesn't attribute the motives one way or another. Not as catchy as red-shirted, not as nasty as pre-flunk, not as wishy-washy as gap year, but it works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How about "delayed kindergarten entrance". Descriptive, non-pejorative, and doesn't attribute the motives one way or another. Not as catchy as red-shirted, not as nasty as pre-flunk, not as wishy-washy as gap year, but it works.

Sounds so perfectly reasonable. But I'm sure it will bring out the ugly and crazy on the private schools board. Just watch.

[Anonymous]

Um . . . those of you attacking the parents seem to forget that this is a private school board and these decisions are made by the schools. And, if you don't like it, you don't have to send your kids there.

All these references to football success are just laughable because if your goal is really, truly to have a successful football player, you won't be sending your DS to most of the area private schools.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous]When curriculum appropriate to older children is shoved down to younger children, big surprise!!!! The younger children, geniuses though they are, can't do it. So, they have to start putting older children in the grade to be successful. True in both public and private. In the past private schools often returned kids transferring from public who had been skipped, to their proper year level. That's different from the current trend to just have older children at each grade level. Kindergarten means "children's garden" not math and reading cage.[/quote]

I think this is more due to "red shirting" The ridiculousness of applying that term to a 5 year old highlights the essence of the problem: way too much jockeying and micro-management of what should be a natural right of passage( or used to be) : KDG when you are 5 ! Unfortunately, now it is all about how late can DS aplly so that he shines in relation to the competition....If a child turns 5 in October say, she is SOL for being able to start pre-K that year due how rigid the system has gotten. My DD was reading, but had an early OCt B-day and had to go to wait a year for pre-K . Our neighbor who's daughter is hyper-active and can't follow directions turned 5 in late Aug. and so is a grade ahead of my child....does this

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Um . . . those of you attacking the parents seem to forget that this is a private school board and these decisions are made by the schools. And, if you don't like it, you don't have to send your kids there.

All these references to football success are just laughable because if your goal is really, truly to have a successful football player, you won't be sending your DS to most of the area private schools.

But the parents said that their kids were not ready not that the school would not admit them. This is the problem the schools have an unofficial cut-off of April for boys.

[Anonymous]

The school often suggests either admission to Pre/JrK to a K applicant or holding off on applying or resubmitting an application the next year. Even if the parents unilaterally decide not to apply to K until their DC is already 5, schools can turn the application down.