Jonathan Chan (sophomore-premedicine) will be celebrating his fifth birthday this February. He is not a child prodigy, but one of few students born on Leap Day.

"My parents thought it was pretty cool that I was born then," Chan said.

When Feb. 29 isn't a part of the calendar, he celebrates whenever he pleases.

"I can celebrate my birthday when it's most convenient for me," he added.

Saeed Smith (sophomore-business) and Karen Piwinski (sophomore-general sciences) were also born on Leap Day, Feb. 29, 1988.

The Gregorian calendar, the world's most widely used calendar, is an alteration of the Romans' Julian calendar. With the Gregorian system, a calendar year was 365.25 days long. In order to maintain cohesiveness with the seasonal and astronomical calendar, the calendar marked a year every 365 days and tacked on an extra day every four years.

Leap Year only occurs every four years, so this Leap Day will be their fifth year celebrating their actual birthday.

Unlike Chan, Piwinski and Smith said they usually celebrate their birthday on Feb. 28 if Feb. 29 is not an option. Piwinski said she did this because she could not fight the anticipation of her birthday when she was younger.

"I have always celebrated my birthday on the 28th because when I was little I couldn't wait until March 1st," Piwinski said.

When his birthday does fall on Leap Year, Smith said, the experience is more special, even if the actual celebration appears the same.

"When it's actually my birthday, it just feels more special than the other years," he said. "I'm more excited about it."

Having only five birthdays by the age of 20 does have its advantages. It can be used to explain lapses in maturity, Smith said.

"Whenever someone would say I was acting immature I would just say, 'Well I'm only 4,' but sometimes that didn't fly," he added.

It can also be used as a way to get placed in a lower age bracket for different events, Chan said.

"Sometimes I would put myself down under the '16 and under' age bracket for some stuff because I technically was only 3 at the time," he added.

The unique birthday can also be a useful conversation piece, especially in awkward situations.

"I always have something interesting to tell people. Everyone always thinks its cool," Smith said.

This birthday comes with its disadvantages as well. On the Internet, Feb. 29 is not recognized an actual birthday, Chan said.

"When I went to enter in my birth date into something on the Internet, an error would occur and tell me to put in a valid birthday," he added.

Their birthdays are also disregarded by Facebook.com's birthday calendar application, and consequently forgotten by many Facebook friends, Chan said.

"Only my really close friends would remember that it was my birthday and send me a Facebook message," Piwinski said.

Though these three students are set apart by their birthdays, Piwinski said she does not believe they are different from anyone else.

"I don't really feel different," she said. "I think, though, that it helped that one of the girls in my elementary school had the same birthday as me, so I didn't really feel alone."

No matter what age they are, Smith said they will have something other birthdays do not: The ability to make them feel young.

"I can always say I'm under 20, at least until I turn 80," he said.