Tue Nguyen, a "boat person" who spoke no English when he fled Vietnam nine years ago, has earned a record seventh degree, a doctorate in nuclear engineering, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Nguyen, 26, is believed to have earned more degrees than any other single alumnus of the school, MIT said. "What else would I do with my free time?" he said, when asked why he pursued so many degrees in his seven years at the school. "I like to read, to learn." Nguyen has five bachelor of science degrees--in physics, computer science and engineering, electrical engineering, mathematics and nuclear engineering--and a master of science degree in nuclear engineering. He worked three jobs in his first year of school and took up to 12 subjects a semester, an amount one of his professors called "staggering." (The normal course load is four.) The super scholar has accepted a job with IBM in Burlington, Vt., designing new technology for semiconductors and plans to marry another MIT graduate.
A White House electrician and his wife gave up a donor liver for their desperately ill daughter at the last minute so the organ could be transplanted into a little boy who would have died without it. Candi Thomas, 6, of Accokeek, Md., was about to undergo her second liver transplant and was already under anesthesia at Children's Hospital in Pittsburgh, when surgeon Dr. Thomas Starzl told Candi's parents, Penny and Stewart Thomas, that Jason Point, 5, of Deale, Md., would die within 24 to 48 hours without the liver. Jason was listed in fair condition after the transplant. Candi, also in fair condition, is still awaiting another donor liver.
