College might be a very good bet for her. She would learn a great deal of useful information. Engineering schools are anxious to enroll women with her skills and interest, so she should be able to get a scholarship
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She may be intellectually ready for college in four years but not emotionally ready. Some kids need to hit the ground running and be independent. I need to prepare her for independence. College, if it is in the cards would come later.
That’s fine. Most students do better in college if they don’t go to college right from HS.
This is an area of much discussion in homeschool circles and with homeschool parents. There are two topics here. What to teach her now? What to do about college?
1.) What to teach your daughter now? If you want to design and teach her that is great. You best know her interests and aptitudes and can tailor it to her. For example my son is on a space kick right now. We will be watching the Curiosity landing on Sunday on a NASA feed. We are doing some viewing in advance to get some back ground on Mars.
2.) What about college. Do you go to any homeschool conferences in your area? You may want to start going to some. I went to a big one and talked to some vendors about college and listened to presenter lectures. There is a lot of shared knowledge to be had. Also you can meet and talk to other homeschool parents about what they did and are planning to do. Anyone with kids in their teens is dealing and thinking about the same things you are thinking about.
There is a lot more than I can put in this reply but here are a few things that I came away from the last Homeschool conference that I attended in May. You may want to look at the work of Matthew Bullington and his site at UniversityReady.com and his contributions to the "Well Planned Day" homeschool planners. Matthews approach is that college is not for everyone but if you are going you must have a plan for high school first, college and what to do after college. Here is an article by him The Case for Organization
A few points I learned from Matthew:
- The primary goal for high school is not college but employment and to become an adult.
- High school is an important time and decisions can have long term consequences.
- If you are going to college you need a plan. If you are planning to take two years in community college and then transfer to another college first find out if they will give you credit for the Com College courses and get it in writing from them. Yes.
Look at the work of Ken Auer who mentors young teens into technical careers many without college. He is very hands on and walks the talk of mentoring. ken has developed a software program to customize mentoring.
Ken's site at Role Model Software does not highlight his work bringing about 20 now young adults into their individual high tech careers. I only know about his work from his presentation at a homeschool conference.
Other presenters suggested that taking one or two years out before going to college will help your child in being more prepared and mature. Especially if they do something in that time to show what they have done with the time out. Teachers appreaciate that more than you may expect.
This just brushes the discussion and I have not done it justice. Good luck.
Regards, Mr Sol.