David Balogun
A nine-year-old boy from Pennsylvania in United States, David Balogun, has become one of the youngest ever high school graduates in the world.
Balogun recently received a diploma from Reach cyber charter school – based in his state’s capital of Harrisburg – after taking classes remotely from his family home in the Philadelphia suburb of Bensalem.
According to UK Guardian, the achievement makes Balogun one of the youngest known children to ever graduate high school
The only person on that list younger than Balogun is Michael Kearney, who still holds the Guinness world record for youngest high school graduate that he set when he was six in 1990, before obtaining master’s degrees at 14 and 18 and then winning more than $1 million on gameshows.
David Balogun would come in higher on that list than the Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Ronan Farrow, who was 11 when he finished high school.
The boy, while speaking on the feat, said he already knows what he wants to dedicate his professional life to once he completes his education.
“I want to be an astrophysicist, and I want to study black holes and supernovas,” he said.
The boy’s parents both have advanced academic degrees, but they said it is challenging to raise a child with such an extraordinary intellect.
His mother, Ronya, said: “I had to get outside of the box.
“Playing pillow fights when you’re not supposed to, throwing the balls in the house. He’s a nine-year-old with the brain that has the capacity to understand and comprehend a lot of concepts beyond his years and sometimes beyond my understanding.”
