For the pros of grade skipping to outweigh the cons, the student should be mature, advanced academically and able to handle social and emotional pressures. Academically, they should be able to work at the proposed level without any special considerations being made to their age. They should be emotionally and socially mature enough to interact with older students, and to deal with the pressure of being different from their peers. Finally, they should be willing and eager to make the skip, and not merely agreeing to it to fulfill parental or teacher expectations.
One of the most important benefits of grade skipping is providing an advanced student with challenging work. If a student is not challenged by their curriculum, they are likely to become bored and lose interest in school. The SMPY longitudinal studies reported higher levels of "boredom, maladjustment, misbehavior and underachievement" in advanced students who were not accelerated. Studies have shown that both learning and motivation are maximized in situations where students are presented with material that meets or slightly exceeds their current capabilities. If they are completing all their school work without any effort, they are also failing to develop important study skills that will be important later in their academic careers. Advanced students who are not adequately challenged early in their academic careers tend to display below-average performance when challenged by college entrance exams or college coursework, even when compared with students with lower measured IQs.
The social drawbacks of grade skipping are some of the most commonly cited arguments against the practice. However, for students who are truly more mature than their peers, interacting with older students often has positive social effects. Many advanced students find it difficult to interact with children their own age, as they may find their behavior immature. Having access to a more mature peer group may allow them to connect with fellow students more successfully. SMPY studies consistently cite accelerated students as having higher self-esteem, stronger peer bonds and greater satisfaction with their social achievements than advanced students who were not accelerated.
Skipping a grade means graduating a year early. This provides a year's head start for college and a career. Gaining an additional year in the prime of life can be a great advantage, especially if the alternative is marking time in a classroom with little left to offer. While it is increasingly common for high schools to provide concurrent enrollment in college-level coursework during the last years of school, these programs are far from universal. For many advanced students, graduation represents a transition into a much more exciting academic and professional world.