Like when someone says, “I’m in 11th grade and this happened”, I’m like “nod and smile”. I get confused every single time.
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In the US public education system. grade is generally but not strictly tied to age. People born between January and August start kindergarten at age 5. For people born September to December, they will start kindergarten between 4-almost-5 and 5-almost-6, depending on the rules of the school district they live in at that point in time. This is often referred to as a “cutoff date” if your school district has a cutoff date of September 30, then a kid who turns 5 on 9/30 this year starts kindergarten this year, but a kid who turns 5 on 10/1 this year starts kindergarten next year. Cutoff dates are usually between 9/1 and 12/31.
Once a child starts kindergarten they will usually advance one grade each year regardless of age going forward. If a child moves to a different school district they are placed based on their grade level at their last school, not their age. So a classroom can end up quite mixed with the kids with those September-to-December birthdays being a birth year apart. A third grade classroom in October might have kids who are 7-almost-8 and kids who are 8-almost-9, but most kids will be 8.
Beyond the standard system, sometimes parents and schools will decide to make adjustments for specific kids. Some children either start kindergarten a year earlier or later, and once enrolled some kids will “skip a grade” and some will “repeat a grade” or “be held back” which adds to the age disparity. This range from common to unheard-of depending on the school district and time period as it is a controversial practice.
Private school systems have a lot more leeway so you are more likely to encounter that 15-year-old college student from a private school than public.
With that, the general brackets include:
Kindergarten 5, 1st grade 6, 2nd grade 7, etc.
Sixth grade 11, 7th grade 12, etc.
High school freshman/9th grade 14
High school senior/12th grade 17
So, on high school graduation most kids are either 17 or 18. But a few might be 16 while some are older.
And on that end of things, public schools will have a maximum age. So a kid who struggles and can’t graduate in 13 years (grade 12 plus kindergarten) gets some extra years of public education trying to get them through high school, then at a certain age—again, district specific but it is usually between 19 and 21—they age out of public school and are on their own to get a GED if they still want it.
Source: attended 12 public schools in 7 districts in 3 states as a child, later was mother of one born in January and one born in September.
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