History Main / CompulsorySchoolAge

* AstroBoy is sent to grade school with human children of his apparent age despite being a robot with a super-advanced AI. Sometimes this is explicitly said to be for the purpose of socialization, sometimes not. Subverted with Astro's robot "parents", who are also sent to school in a lower grade because they're actually younger than him.

[[folder: Anime and Manga ]]

* ''BakuretsuTenshi'' has Meg and Jo infiltrating a boarding school looking for {{Body Horror}}s. It's more of an ExcusePlot to cast them in [[{{Joshikousei}} schoolgirl uniforms]] though.

* Aigis from ''{{Persona 3}}'' goes to the same high school as the rest of the main cast (minus Ken) despite being a RobotGirl who fights Shadows. Somehow, [[PaperThinDisguise no one else notices that she's not really human]]. It's also half her idea, due to her [[StalkerWithACrush obsession with the Protagonist]]. It is also mentioned she has no knowledge about the past 10 years (she was deactivated during that time)

This probably plays into certain insecurities ("back in school" is quite a frequent nightmare from empiric evidence). It may also have to do with children who are visibly ''not'' in school being seen by MoralGuardians as a "bad example". Apparently it hasn't crossed their minds to make up a story about being home-schooled. Probably because [[{{TVNeverLies}} you believe everything you see on TV,]] [[{{AcceptableTarget}} home-schooled kids are weird, socially-inept freaks.]]

* Alice, Jasper, Rosalie, Emmett, and Edward from ''{{Twilight}}'' all go to school, though Rosalie, Emmett, and Jasper eventually graduate. Over the years, however, all of them have done this repeatedly. This is supposedly necessary because the younger they claim to be at the beginning, the longer they can live in one place without arousing suspicion because they don't age. Plus, it just looks weird to have a couple move in with their 5 barely-adult kids. But if the kids are still minors? Not odd at all.

* ''InvaderZim''. Zim is older than any human alive, probably hundreds of years old, yet he attends the local [[strike: School]] Skool, in his efforts learn about humans by observing their human worm babies.

* ''InvaderZim''. Zim is older than any human alive, probably hundreds of years old, yet he attends the local [[strike: School]] Skool, in his efforts learn about human by observing their worm babies.

[[AC:{{Anime}} and {{Manga}}]]

* In ''SpacePirateMito'', the titular character is an alien who is [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld Really Twelve Thousand Years Old]], but looks like a third grader. While spying on her half-human son in high school, she's caught by a teacher and sent to elementary school, and she continues to attend, as seen in later episodes.
* Averted in MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha A's first [[AudioAdaptation Sound Stage]], where Hayate asks [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld Vita]] if she would like to go to school, but Vita says she's not interested.

[[AC:ComicBooks]]

[[AC:FanFiction]]

[[AC:{{Literature}}]]

* In ''{{The Dangerous Days of Daniel X}}'', Daniel tries to avoid this by using his powers to create clones of his parents to tell people he is homeschooled, but he does go to school eventually for a short time.

[[AC:LiveActionTV]]

[[AC:VideoGames]]

[[AC:{{Webcomics}}]]
* Somewhat averted in the current plot in ''ElGoonishShive'', which involves Grace's first day in high school. She's having a hard time due to her genius-level intelligence and [[NoSocialSkills lack of real-world knowledge]], and in the most recent strips it has been suggested that she be put in a remedial class.

[[AC:WebOriginal]]

[[AC:WesternAnimation]]
* Sort of inverted in ''{{My Life as a Teenage Robot}}'', in which, despite being mentally and physically a teenager who happens to be made of metal, Jenny is assigned to a class matching her ''chronological'' age and has to survive a day in kindergarten. They ignore Jenny and the name of the show when they say she was designed to be a ''teenage'' robot, but listen to her mother when she says the same thing, only showing them an unrelated graph when saying it.
** For the record, she gets to go back to high school when her 'mother' tells them she was ''designed'' sixteen years ago. [[MST3KMantra Just go with it.]]
*** [[{{Mondegreen}} She actually says]] "she was designed as a teenager".
* JimmyNeutron is most obviously a scientific genuis, with an IQ well over 300, and ''still'' goes to school to [[FridgeLogic learn about things he most likely already knows]].

* InvaderZim. Zim is older than any human alive, probably hundreds of years old, yet he attends the local [[strike: School]] Skool
** Probably justified, because Zim is trying to observe and learn about humans, and what better way of learning than a classroom?

<<|SchoolTropes|>>

* Alice, Jasper, Rosalie, Emmett, and Edward from ''{{Twilight}}'' all go to school, though Rosalie, Emmett, and Jasper eventually graduate. Over the years, however, all of them have done this repeatedly.
** Of course, most people under such circumstances would have probably just passed as OlderThanTheyLook enough to stay out of school, on the basis that people are more likely to assume someone just looks young for their age rather than being secretly immortal. Seeing as the first of those actually happens in real life, whereas claiming the second means you're a nutjob.

*** And ''bodyguard''. Note that she's seated directly in front of Eva, and that they're in the corner right next to the room's rear exit.

*** [[Mondegreen She actually says]] "she was designed as a teenager".

* Somewhat averted in the current plot in ''ElGoonishShive'', which involves Grace's first day in high school. She's having a hard time due to her genius-level intelligence and [[RaisedByWolves lack of real-world knowledge]], and in the most recent strips it has been suggested that she be put in a remedial class.

* Similarly, the new {{Supergirl}} arrived at the apparent age of 16. She tried to go to high school, but everyone made fun of her so she left. Poor girl.
** And she nearly blew her cover because she couldn't stand a little teasing.

* [[RobotGirl Cameron]] attends school during the first season of ''TheSarahConnorChronicles'', although this was justified by her need to be close to John as much as possible.

* [[AdventuresOfJimmyNeutron Jimmy Neutron]] is most obviously a scientific genuis, with an IQ well over 300, and ''still'' goes to school to [[FridgeLogic learn about things he most likely already knows]].

* InvaderZim. Zim is older than any human alive, probably hundreds of years old, yet he attends the local [[Strike: School]] Skool

* Averted in MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha A's first [[AudioAdapptation Sound Stage]], where Hayate asks [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld Vita]] if she would like to go to school, but Vita says she's not interested.

* Averted in MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha A's first [[AudioAdapptation Sound Stage]], where Hayate asks [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld Vita]] if she would like to go to school, but Vita says she's not interested.
* Shin'ichi Kudo from ''DetectiveConan'' is already a teenager. Then he gets turned into a little kid and ends up having to go back to ''elementary school''.

* ''CaseClosed'' has Conan go back to elementary school even though he is actually a high schooler and due to some wonder drug he now appears to be about 10.

* Shin'ichi Kudo from ''DetectiveConan'' is already a teenager. Then he gets turned into a little kid and ends up having to go back to ''elementary school''.

[[AC:Other]]
* Sometimes seen in fanfics, especially of the [[SelfInsertFic self-insert variety]], to allow the AuthorAvatar to interact with the main cast of a high-school/college-set show or vice-versa.

* ''{{Bleach}}'' has many of the {{shinigami}} show up at Ichigo's high school to check up on him, much to his horror. Their bizarre physical appearances (notably Ikkaku, who's bald and carries a ''bokken'' around with him because he can't have a regular katana), combined with their school uniforms, causes everyone to automatically assume that they're delinquents.