I dunno about this... we're not intimate with his family so it seems a little unfair to characterize his parents as "pushing him". For all we know, the opposite may have happened and his parents were "holding him back" and trying to prevent a precocious teen from rushing into MIT at age 14 instead of 15.
As far as the article's text reveals, it says his parents were responsive and not pushy: "Rungta is grateful to his parents and to MIT for being responsive to his needs every step of the way."
And that is a first hand experience watching 42 gifted smart young children pushed in our education system and over their interessents on behalf of their parents. I attended this school for 6 years.
It was a pain, and as if school wasn't boring enough ( school is mandatory where I live ) you had to consider every word you wanted to say as a 16/17/18 year old when there where 9/10/11 year old depressed and ADHDish, but extremely smart kids around you the whole time.
In the end I am a hundred percent sure every kid can study MIT classes at every age. Most of the stuff is rational trivia. Also beeing gifted has nothing to do with your grades or your ability to follow classes or lectures. Because that's something your parents could've pushed on you, but for sure you are allowed to be happy that they didn't.
Do you mind if I ask where you live? In most of the US school is "mandatory", but pretty much anyone can homeschool if they want.
I'm in the U.S., and I can tell you that having gone to a good, but regular state university for undergrad, and then to much more prestigious university for grad school, the difference between the two was striking. I went from being one of the smarter students in the class, to one of the least smart (or at best, the middle). I expected this university to be better, but it was quite a shock just how much better it was.
Is it possible that what they teach at MIT might go beyond the "trivia" or rote memorization that you describe being taught at your country's schools?
Sure, he will never say bad things about his parents, especially not in the media. He's from India! As I see it parents (in general) can bend things so that children do not want anything else than what their parents want. This is not to blame the parents - they probably don't know better.
From this story I can't tell what is the case. His parents are maybe the best ever, that not only want best for their kid, but actually let him find out what that is.
!
$50K!
! **
! ** *
$40K! ** * Any Questions?
! ** *
! ***** *
$30K! **** *
! **** *
! ***** *
$20K! ***** *
! ***** *
! *** *
$10K! *** *
!** *
! *
0
+--------+----------+-----------+------------+---------+--*--------->
no high some Bachelor's Master's Doctor
high school college Degree Degree of
school diploma Philosophy
diploma