Oxford may stop taking child prodigies
Oxford’s unique status as the last British university to educate child prodigies may soon be a thing of the past, as new child protection legislation forces admissions tutors to reconsider existing policies. A spokeswoman for the university admitted a working party is considering imposing a lower age limit on applicants. It comes as fourteen-year-old Yinan Wang prepares to take up a place at Corpus Christi College to read Material Sciences.
Wang recently scored 98 per cent in an Open University Maths degree that he took ‘just for fun’, but will not be able to enter the college bar until after his graduation. Like Ruth Lawrence, who graduated with a First in Maths in 1985 at the age of just thirteen, Wang will live in Oxford with members of his family for the duration of his degree. Legal concerns mean he is unable to stay in college accommodation.
Lawrence herself has subsequently said that she would not want her own children to follow her example, while another famous child student, fourteen-year-old Sufiah Yusof, ran away from St Hilda’s two years into her course in 2001, claiming she was under too much pressure.
5th Oct 2005