Five-year-old becomes the youngest person to pass a Microsoft Certified Professional exam

Say hello to Ayan Qureshi; he’s the world’s youngest person to pass Microsoft’s “certified professional” exam, accomplishing this at the ripe young age of five. Ayan, who is now six, spends two hours a day in a computer lab that he built by himself built, studying the ins and outs of the Windows operating systems.

The Coventry England-based youth explained to the BBC that studying for the exam was both difficult and enjoyable, indicating that “there were multiple choice questions, drag and drop questions, hotspot questions and scenario-based questions.” When Ayan first arrived at the examination site, proctors were concerned that he was too young to take the exam. The biggest hurdle for Ayan was not the content of the exam itself, but understanding the language in the exam, something Ayan eventually learned to do thanks to guidance from his father, Asim, an IT consultant. 

Ayan’s aptitude stems from having been exposed to computers at the early age of three. Mr. Qureshi allowed the boy to play around with his old computer while teaching him the functions of various components. “I found whatever I was telling him, the next day he'd remember everything I said, so I started to feed him more information,”  explains Mr. Qureshi. 

The Microsoft Certified Professional exam undertaken by Ayan is usually completed by people wanting to become IT technicians working the Microsoft environment. While the lad may be too young to legally work, he may be able to make some tax-free petty cash on the side helping his elderly neighbors. 

The exams take a few hours to complete and consist of 40 to 90 multiple-choice, drag-and-drop, and solution-building questions.  There are four different certifications accredited through examination: Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate (MCSA), Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert (MCSE), Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer (MCSD), and Microsoft Specialist (MS). The specific exam passed by Ayan has not been disclosed; however, we may assume that the at five years old, he would not have had enough time to master the server, desktop, and cloud infrastructure that comes with the MCSE or the Windows Store and web application development associated with the MCSD. Nonetheless, the feat is admirable.

The talented young boy hopes to someday spur a tech hub a UK-based tech hub similar to silicon valley, which he has dreamily named “E-Valley.”

Source: BBC