Joshua Beckford has never been the typical child. At the age of six when most children are preparing for first grade, Joshua went off to college – the prestigious University of Oxford in England, to be exact.
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His father, Knox Daniel, said he first noticed his son was clever when he was sitting on his lap while on the computer. “I started telling him what the letters on the keyboard were and I realized that he was remembering and could understand.”
Named one of the smartest kids in the world by a professor at City University, the now eight-year-old is far too academically advanced to attend third grade with his peers and is homeschooled instead.
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So, what does an eight-year-old super scholar study? Joshua excels at science, math, history, foreign languages and history. He dreams of being a neurosurgeon and is well on his way by practicing gall bladder removals and appendectomy procedures. He also plans to be an astronaut and is currently writing a children’s book about Egypt.
When he isn’t studying and achieving more than many adults, Joshua also serves as the face of the National Autistic Society’s Black and Minority (BME) campaign. Diagnosed with high functioning autism himself, Joshua helps to spread the campaign’s mission of highlighting obstacles blacks face when trying to obtain access to necessary autism support and services.
According to a 2011 study, Autism and the African American Community, “evidence demonstrates that although rates of diagnosis for autism occur at the same rates in all racial groups, diagnosis in African American children occurs later than in White children. As a result, African American children may require longer and more intensive intervention.”
Young Joshua is definitely living proof that no obstacle is too great to keep you from achieving greatness.
