Lindsey Zolp, for instance, dreamed of being an elementary school teacher since third grade.

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His mother, Susan Amini, recalls the day he came home from Somerset Elementary School in the third grade and complained about his recess teacher.

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Today, YES serves students from the third grade through graduate school, though Eisner focuses on the pivotal upper-middle-school years: The kids are old enough for him to reliably evaluate their work ethic and their hunger for knowledge, but young enough that their minds are still growing rapidly.

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He got his first pair of glasses in the third grade after years of fooling school nurses by memorizing the vision chart.

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For Gavin, that meant agreeing with his school to let him skip third grade, and working with teachers to find an appropriate curriculum.

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In third grade, Larry transferred to a Catholic school, where boys and girls wore different uniforms and stood in separate lines before class.

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And think about all those kids right now who are in overcrowded classrooms or don't have a computer science lab -- they're only going to be in third grade once, or juniors in high school once.

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"If my daughter had a standardized test, say, in third (grade), and then eighth, maybe high school, I probably would be OK with that, " Mihelbergel said.

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He had been regarded as a math prodigy from early childhood, and he could solve high-school math problems by the time he was in third grade.

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Elementary school students would most likely take at least one or two additional tests every year, beginning in the third grade.

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