Posted on 09/23/2005 7:45:55 PM PDT by wagglebee
BERKELEY – Charles Pierce really likes playing video games. He practices piano and violin. He used to study aikido, but lately he's been more interested in taking up fencing. Lately, however, the 13-year-old has mostly been hitting the books.
Charles is the youngest transfer student this fall at the University of California, Berkeley, where he's now in his junior year. His 14-year-old sister, Mayumi, also transferred in this fall as a junior.
Attending UC Berkeley is a bit of a family tradition: Their parents, Wincie Pierce and Qin Ma, met and married while they were students at UC Berkeley in the late 1980s.
"We don't think they're geniuses," said Pierce, who got his undergraduate Asian Studies degree in 1991. "We think it's a question of hard work and focus."
Mayumi and Charles seem to be taking the unusual situation in stride, probably because it's not so unusual to them. They're used to being the youngest students in the class, and at least at this point, the age difference isn't so obvious since they're tall enough and old enough to appear in their late teens.
They also already know a number of students on campus. Just walking across Sproul Plaza a few days before classes started, they ran into a friend from a science club at Contra Costa Community College, where they've studied the last few years. A number of students in that club wind up transferring to UC Berkeley as juniors, the Pierces say. Qin Ma, who homeschooled her children until they went to community college, said she is very grateful to the professors there who supported Mayumi and Charles.
"It's a good place to start," said Ma, particularly noting the college's Center for Science Excellence. "It was a wonderful way to participate in the science and math community."
At UC Berkeley, Charles is starting off with classes in philosophy, engineering, chemistry, integrative biology and Yongmudo, a martial art. Mayumi is taking engineering and integrative biology classes, too, and courses in biochemistry and business.
"They're not sure what they want to do yet. Mayumi is thinking about medicine, Charlie is thinking about law. But he just turned 13, so we'll see what happens," said Wincie Pierce.
Charles and Mayumi aren't the youngest transfer students to enter UC Berkeley. In 1996, a transfer student enrolled at the age of 12 years and 10 months, about 2 1/2 months younger than Charles. The youngest freshman was in 2000, when a student began at the age of 14 years and 5 months.
A few weeks into the fall semester, Mayumi and Charles say they're adjusting pretty well to life at UC Berkeley. As with most students, they're finding some classes are pretty tough while others aren't too bad.
"I'm spending most of my time on biochemistry," Mayumi said.
Outside of the classroom, Mayumi teaches kung fu, which she has studied since she was five years old. Charles has pursued aikido and fencing. They both practice the piano and violin and play in youth orchestras. Like most people their age, they both love computer games. But many of these activities will likely take a back seat to academics now that they are studying at UC Berkeley, they said.
How these siblings wound up in college at such a young age is actually very simple, according to their parents. Ma and Pierce didn't originally intend to homeschool their children and sent them off to kindergarten and then Montessori school, Charles for one year and Mayumi for two. But the school relocated further away from them and they reconsidered their options, Pierce said.
"The whole thing with our kids is that we just found it heartbreaking to see their progress slow down when they went to school," he said.
They signed up for a home schooling seminar being held in Berkeley, met some other home schooling parents in the area, and made the plunge.
"We were afraid they wouldn't reach their full potential if they went the normal way," Pierce said.
Ma, who had already received her masters in law, started to homeschool the children while she worked on her J.S.D. dissertation at Boalt. They were up for breakfast at 8 a.m., studied from about 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., and then had an activity of some sort — going to the library and taking music or martial arts lessons — in the afternoon.
"We went to the library a lot, and I let them just read whatever they liked. On Sundays they went to Barnes & Noble to read new books," said Ma, who eventually received her J.S.D. from Boalt Hall in 2000. "Now, it's their favorite place."
Pierce said Mayumi and Charles took to academics naturally, but a lot of that interest came from seeing the people around them reading and talking about academic topics.
"We made it exciting for them. It was a fun thing," he said.
Ma said they never pushed Mayumi and Charles to be early university students.
"Academic achievement is just one part of life," Ma said. "To have a healthy body, an intellectual mind, and a large, loving heart is what our children were told is expected of them. These standards can be simplified into two words: responsibility and love.
"As students, our children have responsibility for their body, family, country and society," she continued. "Love means loving their parents, family, future children and compassion for their fellow students and people in general."
When it was time for the high school equivalency exam, Ma remembers being more nervous than they were, anxiously driving around while they took the three-hour test. "Mostly, it was easy," Mayumi said.
Needless to say, they passed, and in 2001 enrolled at ages 9 and 11 at Contra Costa Community College. Ma enrolled in the classes with them.
"Neither of us has much of a science education, or even math," Pierce said. "They all went together, at first taking the same classes as their mother. They did better than she did."
But their real education there was simply the experience of being in a classroom setting, their father said. "They went to college to learn how to go to college."
They also met a number of students who were transferring to four-year colleges, including most of their friends in the science club. Charles and Mayumi applied to a number of UC campuses, getting in to all of them.
The only hitch in applying was the online form, Pierce said. You have to be 13 or older to be authorized to do an "electronic signature" online, and Charles was still 12 when he applied.
"We're very happy they chose Berkeley," Pierce said.
Today, Ma has returned to the role of breadwinner and it's Pierce who is, for at least these first few weeks of school, taking time out from his startup real estate business to be on campus while his children attend classes. As time goes by — and Mayumi says she's ready to start exploring campus life on her own — he'll just drop them off and pick them up.
And while Charles and Mayumi may be younger than their fellow students, their parents are going through some pretty common emotions for college parents.
"They're both like birds — halfway out of the nest," Ma said.
Homeschool ping.
Why in the world would they choose to go to this crap hole?
That ain't homeschooling thats child abuse.
ping
If they are so smart, why are they at Berkeley?
ping
A few months at Berkeley and they'll be singing "The Internationale" and wearing their red scarves just like the rest of the Communists.
I homeschool, and volunteer to teach certain subjects to children that maybe the parents don't wish to teach for some reason - things like chemistry and art.
When I taught high school algebra I (in a coop to homeschoolers) several parents came and asked me if their very young kids could take the class, because their children were so advanced in math, yet conventional classes turned them away.
I had at least 3 seven year olds who excelled in the class.
I agree that Berkeley is THE LAST PLACE I would want to see anyone attend; however, they still have great reputation in many area, as long as these kids stay away from the leftist courses (which may be impossible), they will still get a good education.
Can it really be a success if they are going to Berkley?? Berkley may just undo everything good done during homeschooling.
Hard sciences are generally not infected as are the Gen Ed classes.
I have a hard time grappling with the concept of 13 yr. olds going to college - much less Berkeley. These kids may be "geniuses" but my guess is they lack social skills and will continue to do so.
Why would anyone who took the time and effort to homeschool send their kids to Berkeley.
That's kind of like buying the winning lottery ticket and giving it all back to the government.
SPOTREP !!!!!
Depends on what they're studying. It's highly ranked in just about everything. I see nothing wrong with a UC Berkley degree in anything other than liberal arts.
When I was in college (granted. it was a community college), I remember a 13 year old on the bbs who went by the user name Poindexter. Sure, he wasn't out partying with the other college kids (he did hang around one particular guy that my now-husband and his friends sometimes gave a hard time). He was considered no different than if he were an 18 year old who was really smart. He wasn't awkward. Says a lot that I can remember him fondly after thirteen years.
Yeah, how will they drink themselves silly, share STDs and trap pot fumes in their room like normal kids?
It didn't sound that way from the story. Sounds like they had made friends at the Community College they had previously attended and that some of those same students were also at Berserkley.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.