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Steamboat Springs — Colin Tucker couldn't help but smile as he thought about his friends rushing to class Friday morning at Steamboat Springs High School. Tucker spent Friday morning rushing to snowboard at the Chevrolet Revolution Tour at Copper Mountain.

There was no need for the 17-year-old Tucker to lug textbooks to the tournament, nor did he have to worry about getting an absentee slip signed. As one of seven mid-year graduates, Tucker's high school life is over a semester early. College awaits, but until then, he's a professional snowboarder.

"I am one of the few professionals in my field that has been educated in a traditional high school with four years of education," said Tucker, who moved to Steamboat Springs as a sophomore from Wisconsin to join the Steamboat Springs Winter Sports Club.

"A lot of the people I know who compete professionally haven't finished high school, but education is really important to me," he said. "My next step is to live off snowboarding and earn money for college, which is something I'd have a hard time doing this season going to school every day."

In order to graduate at mid-year, senior students must fulfill all graduation requirements, attend high school for seven semesters and receive approval from the high school principal, the Steamboat Springs School District superintendent and the Steamboat Springs School Board. Students also must write an essay stating their goals for the future and give an oral presentation before a seven-person graduation committee.

"It definitely was a struggle getting all the requirements done, especially getting four years of English into three and a half years," Tucker said. Summer school at Colorado Mountain College and doubling up on courses at the high school provided a heavy workload, but he said the energy was well spent.

"Unlike a lot of my friends and competitors, I have had to strive to become what I am today," said Tucker, who as a 15-year-old moved to Steamboat alone. He has lived in the basement apartment of Steamboat Springs Middle School teacher Matt Tredway, who is Tucker's housing sponsor through the Winter Sports Club.

"Living on my own was not easy," Tucker wrote in his graduation essay. "Between temptations of drugs and alcohol, temptations of not doing my homework, and always making mature decisions, I had to learn self-discipline while trying to grow up."

Special circumstances

High school Principal Mike Knezevich said each mid-year graduate has a unique story to tell. Natalie Solawetz said graduating mid-year would enable her to take nursing courses and thus be more competitive for admission to nursing school, while Andru Kulas said he will begin EMT classes at CMC this spring. Grant Gardner graduated early to enroll this January at Baylor University, while other students plan to attend trade schools.

"There is not just one stereotype of kid that does this," Knezevich said. "It's just nice to provide that flexibility for kids that have different circumstances. : Most of our kids are hitting senior year with just a few credits needed to graduate. We don't believe in seat time for the sake of seat time at the high school. These kids really may already have those soft skills to be successful in anything."

Stephanie Herman forwent the second half of her senior year to enroll in the Salon Professional Academy of Grand Junction, where the 18-year-old will study to be a cosmetologist.

While taking a break Friday morning from her job as a receptionist at Wildhorse Salon, Herman said it's often hard to believe she's already a high school graduate. Just three years ago, Herman contemplated dropping out of school.

"My sophomore year I really started to not care about school anymore, and I almost dropped out because I didn't think it was important," said Herman, who was failing classes and was falling behind her classmates.

"Then I started realizing I needed my education, I did want to further my life and I wanted to make something of myself," she said. "I decided I could get out of there quicker by doing this and I wanted to move on faster and get things accomplished sooner rather than later."

Daniel Bockelman, 18, said he also wanted to leave high school life and move on with his career.

"I disliked school and I just got so tired of it that when I found out I can get out of here mid-year, I couldn't pass it up," he said. Bockelman enrolled at WyoTech in Laramie, Wyo., where he will study automotive technology.

Kelle Schmidt, a Steamboat Springs High School counselor, said many students are prepared to finish high school because they are ready to move on emotionally and intellectually.

"I've heard a couple of comments that they are just ready to be done with the drama of the social environment," she said. "Administrators often find it hard to break out of the mindset that students need to be in high school for four years to experience the whole gamut of high school. : We are trying to readjust our thinking for students who can be done by the middle of their senior year and ready to move onto other things."

High school experience

Herman and Tucker stressed they are not giving up being a teenagers simply because they're high school graduates.

"I don't feel like I missed out on anything at all," Herman said. "I'm coming back to walk with my class in May, and I think that is the biggest highlight for me. Some people may think I may be missing out on prom, but that is really not what is important to me. I feel like I'm experiencing more by not being there."

Tucker quoted Ralph Waldo Emerson in his graduation essay, writing, "the things taught in schools and colleges are not an education, but the means of education."

"I'm not giving up my friends, and it's not like I have any hard feelings toward the high school or anything," Tucker said as he loaded his truck Friday with snowboarding gear for the weekend event.

"But it's time for me to take the next step in my life, which is going pro," he said. "I'm confident that not only will I become a successful snowboarder, but a successful person because of how much Steamboat Springs High School taught me."