12-year-old begins medical school at the University of Chicago

[Guest guest]

Good grief! Heard it all now! Good luck to the lad...)

Love, light and peace,

Sue

You can't wake a person who is pretending to be asleep. ~ Navajo Proverb

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

http://cbs2chicago.com/illinois/IL--WonderKid-in/resources_news_html

12-year-old begins medical school at the University of Chicago

Sunday August 24, 2003

By MARTHA IRVINE

AP National Writer

CHICAGO (AP) Sho Yano's mother hands him his lunch for school in a brown

paper bag a turkey sandwich and cookies included.

``You don't need any bones today? No bones?'' Kyung Yano asks her quiet,

spectacle-wearing 12-year-old, who shakes his head ``no'' as they head out

their apartment door. She wants to make sure he isn't supposed to take his

samples of spinal bones and a human skull to class, where he's learning

about human anatomy.

It's the kind of morning many young students and their parents experience

except for one thing. Sho isn't in junior high. He's a first-year medical

school student at the University of Chicago, where he's the youngest ever to

attend one of the university's professional schools.

If he weren't also getting his Ph.D. along with his medical degree thus,

pushing his age at graduation to 19 or 20 he'd also be on course to become

the youngest person to graduate from any medical school. According to

Guinness World Records, a 17-year-old graduated from medical school in New

York in 1995.

But Sho is utterly uninterested in setting records. He also shuns the labels

often used to describe him ``prodigy'' and ``little genius'' among them.

Yes, he has an IQ over 200. And yes, he graduated in three years from

Chicago's Loyola University, summa cum laude. But for him, going to school

is about learning as much as he can.

``And there's a lot of stuff to know,'' he says, as he thumbs through one of

his extra-thick medical books.

While many kids his age have been spending their summers at camp or the

beach, Sho has been dissecting a human cadaver and learning the intricacies

of the 12 cranial nerves. And so far, having scored A's on his first few

quizzes, he's handling the course work better than some who are a decade or

more older than him.

Some of his classmates were wary at first. That included Luka Pocivavsek, a

22-year-old medical student who shared a room with his young classmate at a

retreat for new students in the M.D./Ph.D. program.

At first, he thought Sho who often pauses to ponder questions before

answering and chooses his words carefully was very quiet. He wondered how

such a young student could handle the emotional and social rigors of being a

doctor.

But Sho quickly won him over.

``He has surpassed my expectations in every imaginable way,'' Pocivavsek

says. ``His initial shyness has given way to a very sociable guy. And his

understanding of complex social and political issues is very keen and

observant.''

In some ways, Sho is still a typical 12-year old. He has a pet rabbit and

sometimes squabbles with his little sister, Sayuri. And while he's not a fan

of Harry Potter, he adores books by best-selling children's author

Jacques.

At school, he's more of the little brother figure. His classmates tease him,

for instance, about finding a girlfriend. But they also go out of their way

to include him, often socializing in their homes instead of bars or choosing

movies to watch that are rated no higher than PG.

The medical school also has adjusted Sho's schedule a bit, delaying his

clinical work with patients for his last two years in the program.

Still, pathology professor Tony Montag says he sometimes forgets that Sho is

younger than his classmates.

``Of course, to me, they're all kids. So he doesn't seem particularly

different than any of the students,'' says Montag, who teaches Sho and other

first-year students about microscopic tissues in their histology class.

Born in Portland, Ore., Sho spent most of his early years in California,

where his father, Katsura, now runs the American subsidiary of a Japanese

shipping company. Sho lives in the university's family housing with his

mother, who originally came to this country from Korea to study art history,

and 7-year-old Sayuri, a talented student in her own right who wants to be a

cardiologist.

From early on, his mom says it was apparent that Sho was gifted.

His mother recalls trying to master a waltz by Chopin on the piano while

3-year-old Sho played with toy trains below her. Frustrated, she went to the

kitchen to take a break and a few moments later, hurried back in amazement

as she heard Sho playing the piece.

By age 4, he was composing. And by age 7, he was doing high school work

taught by his parents because they couldn't find a school that could

accommodate him.

By age 8, he scored a 1,500 out of 1,600 possible points on the SAT and

started college at age 9.

The response from the public and some of his undergraduate classmates has

not always been positive. Recently, Sho did an Internet search of his name

and was surprised to find many people commenting about his life in blogs (or

Web logs).

``One person said, 'Look at this miserable child with a pushy mother,''' Sho

says. ``Another said, 'Look at this miracle of God with his supportive

parents.'''

Sho smiles at the notion that his parents have pushed him. ``Sometimes, I

kind of pull them along,'' he says.

His mom Kyung says it's difficult to explain what having a child like Sho

has been like. But she and her husband were always clear: ``He will decide

his own life, what he wants to do,'' she says.

They let him choose the University of Chicago even though it meant Sho's

father would have to live apart from them because of his job.

His mom also lets him decide which media interviews he accepts. A few months

back, he turned down a request from talk show host Oprah Winfrey. He told

his mom he wants he do something ``bigger'' before being on TV like becoming

a researcher and professor.

In the end, he says he chose medicine because he wants to help people.

``I wish I could find a big step,'' he says, his eyes widening slightly,

``like a treatment for cancer.''