17-year-old granted degree from Boise State

BOISE – A 17-year-old has become the second-youngest student to graduate from Boise State University, earning his bachelor’s degree in electrical and computer engineering.

Ayush Goyal, son of an Indian hydrologist who moved to the United States in 1993, entered Boise State University in 1999 at age 11. Only Jay Luo was younger, getting a bachelor’s degree in math in 1982 at age 12.

Goyal, among BSU’s top 10 scholars for 2005, graduated summa cum laude and won praise from Boise State University President Robert Kustra at Saturday’s ceremony. He was named one of the country’s four top electrical engineering students for 2005 by Eta Kappa Nu, the national honor society for electrical and computer engineering.

“I’m not impressed by what I’ve done,” he said, displaying modesty that reflects his religion: Goyal is a Hare Krishna who grew up next door to the Boise Hare Krishna temple, where he learned and lectured.

The tenets of Goyal’s faith – mercifulness, self-control, honesty and abstinence from sex before marriage – have given him concentration powers that allowed him to excel academically far beyond his years, he said.

“What questions the teachers asked I could answer because of concentration,” he said.

Goyal’s 13-year-old sister, Shatakshi, is taking BSU classes this year and may also study electrical and computer engineering.

Ayush was born in Roorkee, India, in the foothills of Himalayas, and moved to Idaho at age 5 with his family. He excelled at learning at an early age. By 8, he had memorized more than 100 verses from the ancient religious teaching, the Bhagavad-Gita, in Sanskrit.

His mother taught him the ancient language.

Ayush shot through elementary schools, skipping fifth grade. By age 11, he was enrolled in some BSU classes.

“I never felt out of place,” he said. “Education is not limited to age.”

Ayush expects to take a year to study with a Hara Krishna spiritual master and travel outside the United States. Then he’d like to go to Oxford University in the United Kingdom to study connections between science and spirituality.

Goyal meditates 90 minutes a day.

“It controls your mind,” he said. “For the whole day your mind is peaceful.”

The youngest college graduate was Michael Kearney, who in June 1994 at age 10 years, 4 months, received a bachelor’s in anthropology from the University of South Alabama, according to the Guinness Book of World Records.