How a 9-year-old boy scored top marks in Hong Kong’s DSE exams and what’s next
- Bryan Leung only decided to take the tests as a challenge after watching a YouTube tutorial and says he’s in no hurry to skip more grades.
![Nine-year-old Bryan Leung. The biggest obstacle in taking the notoriously tough tests was not the studying but securing his entry as a primary school student. Photo: Eugene Lee](https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/styles/1020x680/public/d8/images/canvas/2024/07/17/c4d7a04e-ddd3-4301-ba40-65756fb63a61_544b9983.jpg?itok=jiv4jSzK&v=1721224009)
Nine-year-old Bryan Leung Chi-yan never intended to ace part of this year’s university entrance exams in Hong Kong and only ended up taking the tests after watching a YouTube video that challenged him more than his classes did.
Neither is Bryan in any rush to skip any more grades after learning on Wednesday he achieved 5* in the compulsory part of mathematics and 5** in the extended module of algebra and calculus in the Diploma of Secondary Education (DSE) exams. Jumping up the grade ladder, he said, made it difficult to find best friends.
Carrying a big smile and energy to match, the boy said he did not know exactly what the exams entailed when he stumbled across a tutorial video for the maths paper on YouTube. But he decided to give the tests a shot anyway.
“It’s for secondary school students, and I’m in primary school, so I wanted to take [the exams] as a challenge,” Leung said.
The biggest obstacle in taking the notoriously tough tests was not the studying but securing his entry as a primary school student.
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