Posted on 10/24/2026 4:38:49 AM PDT by DFG
A genius New York teen was denied the opportunity to graduate high school early and earn his diploma to attend his dream college due to his age — despite being a full-time community college student.
Michael Sweeney, a 14-year-old homeschooler, is on the verge of applying to Arizona State University to study mechanical engineering, but his dreams were dashed when Bethlehem Central School District denied his request to enter his senior year, the Times Union reported.
The teen, who turns 15 in December, tried multiple times to get approval to graduate early but school officials claimed his homeschool plan didn’t meet the requirements needed for the credits.
Sweeney has outpaced all of his courses offered to him and is currently taking advanced classes, including Calculus III and Physics II at the local college where he’s been enrolled full-time for the last two years.
“He’s moving on to 12th grade,” his mother Nicole Sweeney told the outlet. “He’s testing out of every high school category at this point.”
He is bound by New York State’s compulsory education law that requires all kids between 6 and 16 to attend full-time instruction, meaning Sweeney would have to wait until the 2027-2028 school year to graduate.
The brilliant youngster has taken the California Achievement Test, a standardized exam common among homeschool students to ensure they are learning and not being left behind.
The CAT scores determine the grade level the students are equal to.
Sweeney scored a 13.5 equaling him to a sophomore in college, confirming his grade level is beyond that of a being a high schooler.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
A 14 year old kid from New York wants to go away to college in Arizona? At age 14? Does he have enough social maturity to do that? Even though he’s brilliant academically?
I don’t think anyone mentioned that aspect of things here.
A 14 year old kid from New York wants to go away to college in Arizona? At age 14? Does he have enough social maturity to do that? Even though he’s brilliant academically?
I don’t think anyone mentioned that aspect of things here.
“Ask me how I know.”
I’ve had numerous friends, coworkers, and neighbors caught in that system. The answer is to get a lawyer. Expensive, but it’s the only way they’ll see you as someone they have to deal with.
“No child left ahead”
“So they don’t have a test to see who can graduate high school?”
I think public schools have moved away from using knowledge as a measure of readiness to graduate. This is why so many graduates these days can’t read, write or compute. No one cares whether they are educated, only whether they can be retained as long as possible.
if its ASU they have a completely online set of courses that will get you a bachelors. IIRC. they have electric engineering in that group.
I scored the same thing in CAT for English. Math, no so much
People rarely know how much professors make. Grants, consulting, speaking. It’s a gold mine
Well if he’d be taking online classes, then, that would change things fundamentally, as far as what I was thinking.
To allow this home schooled person to graduate early would be a clear admission of the failure of public schools.
New York has the Regents Exams. If he passes, he gets a diploma, but they still won’t let him go.
So much for fairness for the home educated have a friend she home schooled her kids when they took test with A’s.
Agree
We used to celebrate genius now the libs are trying to kill it.
“No child left ahead”
____________________
So very well put, KB!
That is the new mantra.
The snag in that plan is scholarships. Many state, federal, and university scholarships require a high school diploma.
My children entered college at the ages of 13, 12, and 13. As parents, we paid the full tuition. Because of the lack of a GED or high school diploma, none qualified for scholarships.
The two younger children finished university at the age of 18 with B.S. degrees in mathematics. The oldest was a nationally and internationally accomplished athlete but finished a master’s degree in accounting at the normal age.
Absolute true. However, these idiots voted in the politicians who decided to make 16 the earliest you can attend college. Perhaps the mother should’ve thought twice before voting for who she did especially if she voted the Democrats. In two years, he’ll go to college and he’ll be fine or he just won’t graduate high school get his GED and go onto college immediately.
What happens if the student earns the Regent's diploma and the parents moves out of state?
crap, back in the mid 1976—during my senior year at high school, I went to high school in the morning and Junior College in the afternoon cause there was nothing more I could do in High School. At JC, I took painting classes because I had young visions of becoming and “artist”—yeah that plan turned out well/sarc
Make an exception for this kid. Continue to challenge and inspire him.
Would only suggest that he is given training on dealing with the older students.
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