Even though he's eligible to start school, Levi Hanson won't be going to kindergarten this year.

His parents, Mike and Becky Hanson, won't enroll their almost 5-year-old son even though they say he probably is ready academically. Because his birthday is a little more than a week before the Sept. 1 cutoff date and because he's shy, Becky Hanson says she prefers to wait.

"He does really well in preschool," the Crooks, S.D., woman says. "But I don't ever want him to struggle in school. Too many times, we see kids who struggle and end up hating school because of it and then later on are labeled troublemakers."

More and more parents struggle with when to send their children to kindergarten.

It's no longer just boys with summer birthdays who wait a year. Parents whose children are born even six months or more before the school's enrollment cutoff date have kept their child at home an extra year, filling the kindergarten classroom with kids who've just turned 5 and others who are 6 or older says Dr. Gera Jacobs, an early childhood education professor at the University of South Dakota. "You have kids who don't know any letters of the alphabet and kids who are already reading," she says.

With emphasis on school and individual performance under the federal No Child Left Behind standards, academics are emphasized even in kindergarten.

"Preschool is yesterday's kindergarten. Kindergarten today is the old first grade," says Stephanie Spaan, director of Excel Achievement Center in Sioux Falls, S.D. "There's a lot more curriculum for kids to get through."

While the state doesn't collect records on the number of students who are eligible for kindergarten but whose parents delay their entry, the National Center for Education Statistics found in a 1998 survey that 6 percent of kindergarteners had delayed entry.

A TOUGH DECISION

The Sioux Falls School District doesn't keep records but fields questions annually from concerned parents, says Rich Meier, elementary curriculum coordinator for the district.

"We get the same kind of questions year after year," he says. "We're willing to sit down and discuss it any way we can."

Parents, particularly those such as Hanson, whose children have summer birthdays, worry whether they should enroll their children in kindergarten when they are eligible or whether they should wait a year, Spaan says. "The majority of people these days are thinking about it," she says.

Spaan waited to send her son, now a sixth-grader, even though his birthday is in April, well ahead of the cutoff date. "My whole family thought I was crazy," she says. "But socially, he was behind. Now he's a super-strong leader, and he does well academically and socially."

And even after the decision's made, some parents second-guess themselves. Christa McDermott wishes she'd waited to send her son Cooper, who just finished first grade, to kindergarten. Academically, he was ready, but his maturity level was in question. But with another baby on the way and additional day care costs looming, the McDermotts decided to enroll Cooper. "He did fine, but we did have a few problems with maturity," the Salem, S.D., woman says.

The benefits of delaying entry into kindergarten, however, are mixed.

Research conducted by the RAND Corp. in 2003 indicates that delaying kindergarten entrance is associated with a significant increase in math and reading scores by 6 points and more than 5 points, respectively. But the advantage usually evens out by third grade, Jacobs says. "Just because you start something earlier doesn't mean you're going to be better at it," she says. "If you give them some time, kids will be able to catch up."

Besides academics, ensuring a child's social and emotional maturity is on level with his or her classmates can help in the classroom, Spaan says.

"They tend to feel like they're not as up to par as some of their classmates if they're behind maturity-wise," she says. "Yes, I think they can catch up, but to what detriment? Is there going to be some psychological damage?"

WIDE RANGE OF LEARNERS

There can be a stigma attached to being one of the oldest children in the class, Jacobs says. And as kids advance in school, older students might have a greater tendency to drop out of high school, she says.

Postponing school can place a significant economic burden on families, forcing them to bear an extra year of either the monetary or time costs of child care, Jacobs says. Students who go before they're ready, combined with those who wait an extra year, add up to a wide spread in ages and skills for teachers to work with.

Because kindergartners come to school with a variety of backgrounds anyway, teachers are prepared to deal with that, says Val Peters, early childhood coordinator with the Sioux Falls School District.

Before kindergarten, kids should be showing an interest in writing and numbers and be ready to count, Peters says. That doesn't mean they have to have mastered the skills. They also should be showing an ability to take care of themselves. They should be able to put on their own coat and go to the bathroom independently.

But parents probably will notice that kindergarten has changed.

"The curriculum has been pushed down, and they are working in more advanced concepts in kindergarten than they used to," she says.

Still, Meier doesn't like to say it's drastically different. At its core, kindergarten still is a developmental program, he says. "We have to meet children's needs no matter where they are developmentally," he says. "We need to work on those skills and help bring them forward."

Jacobs understands that parents are going to carefully weigh the pros and the cons. "It's an important decision. I can understand - totally understand - parents really thinking about it."

Another year of preschool should boost Levi Hanson's confidence, his mother says. "Bless his heart if he's a genius when he goes to school. He can always be put in advanced classes if that's the case," she says.