<p>[Prodigy</a> earns University of Chicago medical degree at 21 | The Lookout - Yahoo! News](<a href=“http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/prodigy-earns-university-chicago-medical-degree-21-144127049.html]Prodigy”>Prodigy earns University of Chicago medical degree at 21)</p>
<p>He entered the U of C medical school at 12 and finally finished at 21. Nine years to finish a medical school? Even the Chinese are slacking off 
what’s the world coming to!</p>
<p>He got a PhD along the way. That took him 5 years.</p>
<p>He essentially has MD/PhD. It is normally an 8 year program but PhD can take as long as it can take since one can run into difficulties with research topics.</p>
<p>actually, the MD & PH.D. combo does NOT take 5+3= 8 years. It’s a condensed program.</p>
<p>But, I think the real reason is because a second or third year medical students start interacting with patients, and they couldn’t let a 13 year old doing this: probably some kind of a liability concern (I am guessing), and more importantly, I can’t imagine any patient being happy with a 13 year old kid playing doctor with them. They probably had to “let” him age a bit before they let him loose with patients.</p>
<p>The defined official duration for MD/PhD is 8 years. It took him 9.</p>
<p>I know several people doing them. They have a specified way to space it. Someone I know finished research last summer and finishing up the last two years of MD rotations now but I guess the dissertation took a while and so PhD was awarded last month and will get MD next summer.</p>
<p>I also know someone taking much longer with research because half way through research, it was found that someone else did the same topic and just published it and so this person had to start over.</p>
<p>Wow, we actually talked about him in AP Psych but I didn’t know that he attended UChicago until now. Congratulations!</p>
<p>Also with a name like that, I’m 99% sure he’s not Chinese. Probably Japanese ;)</p>
<p>Enrollment:
[USATODAY.com</a> - 12-year-old begins medical school at the University of Chicago](<a href=“http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2003-08-24-prodigy-school_x.htm]USATODAY.com”>http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2003-08-24-prodigy-school_x.htm)</p>
<p>Graduation:
[Child</a> prodigy Sho Yano earns medical degree at age 21](<a href=“http://content.usatoday.com/communities/ondeadline/post/2012/06/child-prodigy-sho-yano-earns-medical-doctorate-at-age-21/1#.T81mFL-re00]Child”>Child prodigy Sho Yano earns medical degree at age 21)</p>
<p>[M.D</a>. at 21, Sho Yano Is Real-Life ‘Doogie Howser’ - ABC News](<a href=“http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2012/06/m-d-at-21-sho-yano-is-real-life-doogie-howser/]M.D”>M.D. at 21, Sho Yano Is Real-Life 'Doogie Howser' - ABC News)</p>
<p>UChicago is known for taking chances with younger students. A couple of well-known alumni matriculated (either as undergrads or as grad/professional students) when they were very young. </p>
<p>Examples include: Janet Rowley (got an MD at the age of 23), James Watson (began College at the age of 15), Bruce Beutler (began Pritzker at the age of 19).</p>
<p>And congratulations Sho Yano!</p>
<p>Some states require you be a minimum age of 21 before being licensed as a physician, so that may have come into play in stretching out the program…</p>
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<p>I think that Dr. Yano has a Korean mom and a Japanese father. They apparently met while they were students here in the States.</p>
<p>i have friends that will be taking 9 years to finish their md/phd. the length of time depends on your phd stuff. they are around 28 right now</p>
<p>I’m not sure what the title is getting at in calling this situation humorous. Imagine the title: “humor: a student takes an extra quarter of summer classes to graduate from the U of C.”</p>
<p>It is humorus because the title sounds like it is about a slacker but the article is about a pordigy who accomplished it at a tender age of 21.</p>
<p>On the Tribune site, you can hear him speak in his own voice. Maybe we will have promising news in the future on autism.</p>
<p>so you think being 13 NECESSARILY mean emotion and social immaturity?</p>
<p>Ummmmmmmm… i have seen/heard about so many 18-22 heavy partying, drunken college kids who are so incredibility immature, the ones who commit date rapes,and and the bigoted ones who go and put graffiti to black student association building in some campuses…</p>
<p>Should we now demand psychologists’ evaluation as part of the college application process?</p>
<p>Objective Person said:</p>
<p>“That UofC accepted a 13 year old student to its medical school is more proof of the fact that the school simply doesn’t care about emotional or social development.”</p>
<p>That was always it, right? U of C cared merely about intellectual prowess over all else, and valued precociousness more than any other school (see graduates like James Watson or Ed Levi).</p>
<p>It’s strange, you seem to address U of C’s problems as if they were unsurmountable, and describe the institution as if it is immutable. I just don’t know how you see this to be the case, unless you consider the U of C to be virtually the same institution for the past ~60-80 years. </p>
<p>Objectiveperson, should the U of C be forsaken? Are the problems it faces impossible to solve? Has no progress been made, at long last?</p>
<p>So, ultimately - there is no hope for the school? Changing the school would be impossible? Or what would it take?</p>
<p>Shallow… But whatever. I cant expect everyone to put thought into their comments. :D</p>
<p>Objectiveperson, if you really don’t believe in UChicago that much, I think your posts would be more influential if you talked about the benefits of other schools on their respective forums as opposed to continually deploring UChicago.</p>
<p>sa209 - agreed. Objective Person hated UChicago, but I wonder what schools he/she would applaud? From what I can tell, Objective Person would seem to hate all schools, and its more that UChicago has more “rot” than the rest - but all schools have “blackened souls.” </p>
<p>If Objective Person hates on UChicago for having insecurities, engaging in very troubled relations with the rest of the neighborhood, and not investing enough in the social/emotional development of its students, how would any school pass Objective Person’s tests? Yale, Dartmouth, Hopkins, etc. etc. all fall prey to the same problems, although perhaps not to UChicago’s level. </p>
<p>Objective Person, UChicago may have the “most” “rot,” but should all top american schools also be forsaken, since virtually all of them - to some degree - share many of UChicago’s woes? If not, what are the schools you admire?</p>