Even before graduating from university, he found a job with one of the best-known companies in the world. There would be nothing special about a story repeated daily for hundreds of young people if the story’s protagonist were not a 14-year-old boy. Kairan Quazi is little more than a child, but in school, he was one of the few who set the pace, becoming the youngest graduate in the 172-year history of Santa Clara University in California. Indeed, this is not the first case of an enfant prodige going from playing ball with his peers to discussing programming with boys eight or nine years older, but Quazi’s is a sensational story that gives one pause for thought.

The big jump: from third grade to college

That the child was not like his peers had been realised early on because as early as the age of two, he began to speak in complete sentences, while during his first lessons with teachers and classmates, he told them the news he had heard on the radio. Little genius traits continued as he grew up, especially at school, where he could not satiate his interests by following the standard path with his peers. So the first turning point came when he was nine years old, with his parents, teachers and paediatrician agreeing to advance his studies.

Going from third grade to a college is anything but easy, even to be accepted by others, so after much searching Quazi found acceptance at Las Positas College in Livermore, California. Here he studied and later served as a tutor for other students.

I wonder if the child ever thought about the childhood moments he shared with friends of the same age that he did not experience by virtue of his cognitive abilities. However, Kairan was clear on this point: “I don’t regret anything,” he said, adding that the important thing was to continue learning at the right level.

Enthusiasm seems to surround his life, both at school and outside, where the teenager does not live in an ivory tower devoting his time exclusively to his studies, but instead dabbles between a game of Assassin’s Creed and reading science fiction novels, with a particular fondness for the books of Philip K. Dick, but also for the works of Michael Lewis, the financial journalist known for writing The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, the book on the 2008 financial crisis born out of subprime mortgages on which the film The Big Bet was later based.

The next SpaceX software engineer

Think that’s the end of the story? No, because the most interesting part is yet to come. In addition to making history at Santa Clara University, where he was also a member of the student senate (a further sign of integration with the other students), Quazi will enjoy a few days off after graduation because he will soon start his first job.

Over the past few months, the boy has expressed his interest in joining SpaceX, considered by the Golden Boy to be one of the few companies that allow people to work on technologies useful for the common good. After a remote interview in April, in early May, the company offered him a position as a software engineer at Starlink, the satellite internet constellation operated by SpaceX, providing satellite internet access coverage to over 60 countries. So in the coming weeks, Quazi will move with his mother to Redmond, Washington state, to start his job.

“I’m going to join the coolest company on the planet,” commented the kid, happy for another reason. “SpaceX is one of the few companies that doesn’t stop at age, an arbitrary and outdated indicator of maturity. I hope my story can help leaders re-evaluate the prejudices that accompany the hiring process so that other neurodiverse people like me can benefit,” Quazi said.

He speaks enthusiastically and, thanks to his young age and previous experiences at Intel Labs and Blackbird.AI, feels no pressure for the task ahead of him. “I’m not worried, why should I be? I like what I’m doing and I’m passionate about the idea of being able to work at SpaceX.” Even if he will have to be accompanied by his mother each time to go to work and back home, Kairan is extremely intelligent but not immune to the law prohibiting him from driving a car for another two years.