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University of Virginia Student Graduates in One Year
An anonymous reader writes "18-year-old David Banh of Annandale, VA recently graduated from the University of Virginia with a double major in Physics and Mathematics, and an education paid for almost entirely by scholarships. What's truly amazing is that he did it in one year, bringing in 72 Advanced Placement credits, then taking 23 credits his fall semester, 37 credits his spring semester and 3 credits in the summer. His brief undergraduate career didn't leave him much time to explore college, so he's now working on his master's degree. He says he may eventually pursue law school as a part-time student in hopes of becoming a patent lawyer."
What he did:
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Basically, it's a neat feat that took years to prepare for, like going through a process to be "pre-qualified", but he isn't quite Doogie.
Have you read my journal today?
And what does he want to be after he completes his education (he is now entering a math masters program)?
A patent attorney.
Many IV league schools no longer accept AP credits. They want you to get an education from THEIR institution. If you enroll into a school with 72 credits, about half of your university education doesn't even come from the university you attended. This is why many schools are following the examples of the IV league institutions.
Agreed. If classes were offered more frequently, that would have helped me, too.
When I attended college, the university typically would offer the first class of a series only in the Fall quarter, the second class in the series only in the Winter quarter and the third class only in Spring quarter. If you could not take the first class in the chain in Fall (either because it conficted with another class, or because the class size was too large and you were denied the opportunity), then you'd have to wait an entire year to try again.
I ran into that situation as a "senior" (during my 4th year) and ended up having to come back for two quarters of a 5th year, taking one class each quarter, because I needed them to graduate.
College has been about both since around the time it started. There are old letters from European university students writing home to ask their parents for further funds. I read quite a few examples of such texts in medieval history classes that I took while at college.
One of them stuck in my mind because of a quote contained in it that basically said without Bacchus, Apollo grows cold.
Whether you like it or not, one of the really important parts of college are the experiences and bonding.
Everything I need to know I learned by killing smart people and eating their brains.
I saw an interview with him last night on the local news. One thing mentioned in the interview (that wasn't discussed in the article) is that a primary motivation for him to finish school so quickly was a desire not to burden his parents or himself with any debt. He has younger brothers (can't remember the exact number) and didn't want the cost of his education to negatively effect their ability to go later. I am sure he missed out on a lot of the "college experience" but with the cost of tuition nowadays, not sure I blame his desire to get it over with as quickly/cheaply as possible.
MIT perspective: I've had friends take as many as 12 classes (48 credits by that standard), mostly math and physics graduate level classes, get all A's and still have a social life and be very active in clubs.. if you're intelligent enough to learn a semesters worth of material in a day, this kind of accomplishment is really not that striking. If I'd gone to my state school (on par with UVa), I would have entered 2 math classes shy of a degree with all the humanities requirement fulfilled by those silly AP games. However, MIT only accepts very limited transfer credit, AP credit for biology and ap calc bc, (and only 5s).
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