different kinds of opportunity for college-level work before graduation.

It is much too early yet to predict the future of the early admission idea, but the evidence in this report clearly indicates that under the proper circumstances it represents a promising approach to the problem of enabling the very best students to realize their full potential. The risks of entering college early have been the subject of much popular concern, and properly so. But too little thought has been given to the risks run by an able student in an unchallenging environment in not entering college early. As one of the Scholars wrote in his senior essay: "There is some danger that a young student's talents will be harmed by being thrust among older students who do not accept him. But the greater danger is that he will be allowed to stagnate in secondary school and will arrive in college lacking imagination and ambition, these having been `educated' out of him. The harm to him and society is great."

Richard Pearson observed in his report that "the important lesson from the Early Admission experiment is that the American educational system cannot afford to overlook the individuality of the students with whom it deals. Whether these students are normal age or underage, or whether they have completed a formal program in secondary school is probably of less importance than their capabilities and aspirations as individuals. The contribution of the schools and colleges to society is likely to be gauged in terms of how well these are recognized and developed, rather than in terms of formal structures and prescribed programs."

Yet there is some danger that in the decades ahead, when American colleges and universities become engrossed in the problems attendant upon steeply rising enrollments, the capabilities and aspirations of the "unusual" student are likely to be neglected. College admissions officers, confronted with the happy prospect of having many more applications for admission than there are places to be filled, may well tend to "play it safe"