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At age 12, it's off to medical school
After facing the demands of college as 9-year-old, prodigy prepares to attend University of Chicago
By Meg McSherry Breslin
Tribune staff reporter
Published May 1, 2003
Some said that at 9 years old, Sho Yano was too young for college. Then he graduated in three years. Summa cum laude. This June, the shy 12-year-old, who speaks barely above a whisper, will defy the skeptics once again when he becomes perhaps the youngest student to enroll in a medical school. He has been awarded a full scholarship to the University of Chicago.
The pudgy cheeks of his freshman year at Loyola University are gone, but there's still plenty of growing to do. He stands 5 feet 5 inches tall, his voice hasn't yet changed and his parents rarely allow movies that aren't rated G.
His application raised red flags at some of the nation's top medical schools, a fact that perplexes Sho.
"They said I was just too young," Sho said. "One person said he thought patients would be shocked."
University of Chicago medical school officials had similar concerns but overcame them after meeting what they saw as an amazing, gentle prodigy who answered tough questions with maturity and thoughtfulness. Sho will enter one of U. of C.'s most competitive programs, the medical scientist in-training program leading to both an MD and a PhD.
There have been reports of students as young as 14 entering medical school, but no high-profile cases of 12-year-olds. According to the Association of American Medical Colleges, less than 1 percent of medical school students are under 18.
Sho had perfect scores in the quantitative and analytical sections of the graduate school admissions test. His Medical College Admissions Test scores--at 13 or 14 out of 15 for each of the sections--make him among the best of the best.
But at the California school interviews--his mother prefers not to identify the school--one medical school administrator accused Sho's mom of using her son to set a world record.
After years raising an exceptional son, Kyung Yano is used to accusations that she's a pushy mom. Even if it was always Sho asking to advance, some outsiders figured mom was behind it all.
"From the beginning, some psychologists said he would be miserable all through his life," she said. "They'll say again how much he'll suffer."
The U. of C. admissions team had some of the same reservations about Sho that Loyola faced three years ago.
Could he handle the intellectual demands, the lack of sleep? Would he be ostracized by a group of students twice his age? Would he miss out on the normal pleasures of a 12-year-old's life?
Because of those concerns, Sho met with triple the number of U. of C. professors and students compared with typical applicants. The university's acclaimed child psychiatrist, Dr. Bennett Leventhal, evaluated him.
Medical school professors asked Sho a number of questions about working with patients. In each case, his answers showed a remarkable sense of empathy for patients and their families, said Dr. Lawrence Wood, dean of students and medical education at U. of C.
For example, they asked Sho what he would say to a severely ill mother who had just delivered newborn twins?
Sho paused for a long while, which is his style. The first words out of his mouth convinced Wood this demure child had the right stuff.
"She must be very scared," Sho told Wood that day.
The overwhelming feeling was that Sho should be welcomed, that U. of C. had a shot at enrolling a budding scientist with great potential.
But U. of C. also made some accommodations. Sho will earn his doctorate first, then complete medical school, not having regular interaction with patients until he's 17 or 18. The family will also move to Hyde Park.
Sho has read the Bible several times and talks about how his decision to enter medicine comes from a desire to help people.
He rarely watches television and has never played a Nintendo video game. There are no Britney Spears posters on the bedroom wall in his home on a quiet cul-de-sac in Glenview. Instead, there were only yellowed newspaper articles on genetics research.
Early achievements
A music prodigy who was playing entire Mozart pieces and composing his own music by 4, Sho spends most of his free time at the piano. He also finds time, though, for swimming and tae kwon do (he's a black belt).
Sho whizzed through Loyola, studying over the summers and earning a 3.9 grade point average. (He says he didn't deserve the one B, but doesn't want to get into the details.) After spending hours in a biology laboratory studying retroviruses in soybean plants, he presents research papers at campus symposiums with such titles as: "Structural and Functional Components of Putative Plant Retrotransposon Diaspora."
"We have to appreciate that he's 12 years old and he has completed college," said Michelle LeBeau, a U. of C. professor of medicine who leads the cancer biology program in which Sho hopes to study. "He's ready to move on to the next step of his education. It's not practical for him to stay at home. What do we expect him to do?"
That's the main question Sho's parents have been asking for years.
The Yanos are highly educated and bright. His mother is a Korean immigrant with a master's degree in art history. Sho's father, Katsura, is a U.S. business executive for a Japanese company who was a stellar student in his native Japan. But neither of his parents' talents ever matched their son's, nor those of their 6-year-old daughter, who seems to be on the same track as Sho.
As a small child, Sho's IQ measured around 200, well above the range for geniuses. Some elite primary schools said he was too bright for them. He spent several years at a California gifted school, but his mother often supplemented with lessons at home when he still soared beyond his peers.
Bigger challenges
By 9, Sho craved bigger challenges. He desperately wanted a university education.
"I just wanted to learn at my own pace," he said in his family living room as he chased his pet rabbit. "I don't see why I have to be held back."
Although Sho had the support of top leadership at Loyola, his family saw right away how the campus was divided over his admission.
"It was rocky, rocky, rocky," Sho's mom said of his first year.
Then a 4-foot-7-inch undergraduate who needed a stool to reach the laboratory microscopes, Sho was ridiculed by some students and faculty who thought he was too young for university life.
There was also a deluge of media coverage, including a front-page story in the Chicago Tribune followed by a feature on "60 Minutes II." He wrote a book for a Japanese publisher, an account of his first year at Loyola titled "The Diary of a Wonder Boy."
"People said it was a media circus and that we were trying to make a show," his mother said. Sho's mom was frustrated by the critics because she carefully limited the interviews, turning down many requests.
Over time, Sho's cadre of friends and supporters grew.
Many were impressed not only with his intellect, but with his ability to move quickly from a child's awkward concerns to the demands of university work.
"Socially, we treated him like a little brother," said classmate Erich Gerhardt.
"But academically, he was above us."
Sho doesn't speak a lot. He seems to prefer more formal communication, and leans toward e-mails over phone conversations.
"Sho is remarkably thoughtful and mature in his thinking. That's the key," said Loyola classical studies professor Gregory Dobrov. "He regularly can produce reflections on questions that you'd expect to only make sense to a middle-aged person or a fully-formed adult."
Sho is disciplined and diligent--he read an entire 800-page genetics textbook before the course even started. He says he never procrastinates. But he doesn't need to study much.
"People think I study all the time," Sho wrote in an e-mail, "but I sleep 9-10 hours a day and sometimes my mother and my little sister consider me too lazy."
Still a kid
Sho's brilliance makes it easy to forget he's still a kid, said Howard Laten, a biology professor and adviser to Sho.
But there were funny reminders. Sho grew impatient with fellow students, grabbing papers out of their hands when he wanted to move quicker. He sometimes left his work area a mess. His sweet-faced little sister, Sayuri, is known to frustrate him too, especially after she colored all the rabbits in his biology textbook in pink permanent marker. Sho worried classmates might think he colored the book, so he folded over the colored parts.
Laten also saw the ugly side to what Sho experienced at Loyola, especially in his first months. As Sho applied to medical school, Laten worried about attitudes he would confront there as well.
"It was really clear to me that wherever he went, the university should take it on as a personal responsibility and help him succeed," Laten said. "These issues will come up in spades. It's the nature of the medical profession."
Yet the boy himself doesn't see a need for special treatment. He would rather just dive in and ignore all the attention.
"People just need to know my talent is from God," he said in his quiet tone one day on campus, "and I will use it for other people as much as I can."
Then with his mom and sister by his side, he walked on in his determined way, his head held down.
Copyright ? 2003, Chicago Tribune
