- Source: Kairan Quazi
Kairan Quazi (Bengali: কাইরান কাজী; born 27 January 2009) is a Bangladeshi American software engineer at the American aerospace manufacturer company SpaceX. At age 14, he graduated from the Santa Clara University School of Engineering in 2023, becoming the university's youngest ever graduate. Simultaneously, he was recruited by SpaceX in June 2023 to become the youngest engineer at Starlink, the company's satellite internet team. For his precocious educational achievements, he has been labelled "wonder kid".
Early life and family
Kairan was born in Pleasanton, California to Bangladeshi parents Mustahid Quazi and Jullia Quazi née Chowdhury. He belongs to a family of Muslim Quazis from Manikganj. In Bangladesh, his father was a chemical engineer and his mother a Wall Street executive. Doctors assessed his intellectual and emotional intelligence at age 2 as "off the charts". He first entered Mensa International, a program for individuals with a high IQ, and became a Davidson Institute Young Scholar. Then he went to The Quarry Lane School for the rest of his elementary education. When asked if he was a genius, he would divert the answer to his mother's remarks, saying: "Mom says she's the only genius in the house because it takes one to keep [their] house from falling apart!" He added: "Mom also claims that IQ comes from the 'X' chromosome."
College education
Recognising his precocity, Kairan was advised by his family doctor and school teachers to enroll in college while he was still in third grade. He had already developed a passion for calculus and organic chemistry which the school could not offer in its curriculum. His psychologist assessed him as "an outlier among outliers," and recommended that Kairan was ready for a college. Dan Peters, psychologist and executive director of the Summit Center assessed him and suggested he join the Helios School, a private school for gifted children. At age nine, in 2018, he simultaneously entered the Helios School and the Las Positas Community College, where he studied mathematics and chemistry, and received his associates degree in science. In 2018, he simultaneously completed California's high school equivalency exam, a requisite for full college enrolment. At Las Positas, he became the youngest ever student and tutor, and was a highly regarded STEM tutor. In 2019, after applying for many internships, he was finally accepted by Lama Nachman, director of the Intelligent Systems Research Lab at Intel. Kairan said his internship with Nachman "changed everything".
In 2020, at age 11, Quazi transferred to Santa Clara University (SCU) and studied computer science and engineering. In 2022, he completed an internship at a cyber intelligence firm, Blackbird.AI. He was elected as a Senior Senator in the Associated Student Government of the university. He officially graduated on 17 June 2023. With a degree in software engineering, Kairan is the youngest student to ever graduate from Santa Clara University.
Career
By February 2023, Kairan already received three employment offers. In April 2023, Quazi announced on Instagram that he was ready for a major job interview. Several companies rejected his applications, but SpaceX gave him the opportunity. His parents "prepared him for disappointment", as his mother took him to Seattle to face the interview. The company announced his appointment on 13 June, posting on Twitter: "SpaceX hires the best, brightest and smartest engineers in the world, even a 14-year-old by the name of Kairan Quazi, who will start his new job on SpaceX's Starlink team on July 31." He is set up to move to Redmond with his mother by the end of July 2023.
When Kairan announced his new appointment in LinkedIn, saying, "Next stop: Space X! I will be joining the coolest company on the planet," the professional online platform soon deleted his account. LinkedIn requires 16 years of age to use its service. It informed Kairan that he would be welcomed to join when he turned 16. Kairan responded by remarking the situation "illogical, primitive nonsense" as he was already employed in a profession.
