[quote pitterpatterrain]@extrastrongmints can I ask a question - what are you suggesting they are accelerated towards? Ie are you thinking they do gcse / a-levels early? Enter a degree early (although oxbridge ime ask accelerated candidates to delay before attending)
Mainly my question with acceleration is “to what” as I agree - if they are finding it easy no amount of acceleration is going to make it less dull until you get to degree level and even then it will probably be “more stuff” vs that challenging[/quote]
Successive international comparisons (PISA, TIMMS) have shown that by mid-teens, the UK student cohort are working about two years behind leading regions like Singapore and Shanghai, with very few high attainers in UK comprehensive schools. The government has stated an ambition to catch up, yet continues to hold our own brightest students back. The obvious question is then why we don't allow those who are capable of doing so to work at a significantly higher level.
"if they are finding it easy no amount of acceleration is going to make it less dull"
This is not true. It stems from a fallacy prevalent in UK teaching circles is that allowing perhaps one year's acceleration is meaningful and sufficient, whereas the degree of acceleration should be based on the prior attainment of the learner.
"what are you suggesting they are accelerated towards?"
Interestingly, nobody asks the same question in e.g. music or sports. If a student shows natural talent in those areas, then their teachers/mentors allow them to progress at their natural rate. In those areas, excellence is seen as an end in itself. If you heard a music teacher say "I'd better not give this kid any grade 6 pieces until they're 16, or they'll have done their grade 8 before they're 18 and then they'll be bored on their music degree." you'd probably think they're a certifiable loon, but when a maths teacher holds similar views, nobody bats an eyelid.
"are you thinking they do gcse / a-levels early?"
We should distinguish between providing advanced content and instruction, versus taking high stakes external exams, but some students would be well served by doing so. Some parents have found that a high grade at GCSE taken several years early meant that the school could no longer pretend the child was not exceptionally able (though that should not have been necessary).
"although oxbridge ime ask accelerated candidates to delay before attending"
they might "ask" but they are skating on thin ice legally, because age is a protected characteristic under the 2010 equality act, and while schools were given an exemption, universities were not, so university admissions must be legally age-blind. It's not the case that any university can require students to delay until 18, except for medicine and related courses, where the GMC imposes a requirement that students must have turned 18 before the end of their first term of study.
Thousands of students each year begin attendance at university in the UK before the age of 18 and Cambridge admits about 70 under 18's each year, so they do not ask students to delay in all cases. But most are from overseas, and are seen as "overseas students" rather than "accelerated students", because UK schools hold our brightest students back.