Among the winners at the latest UMD career fair is one of Maryland’s rising stars — “middle school freshman” Link Ding, who just secured an internship at NASA. Ding will try to compute the trajectory of Asteroid 12410 Donald Duck this summer while his classmates whip out calculators for their arithmetic worksheets and roam about Disneyland.

Ding boasts an impressive resume brimming with honors, including designing an aircraft that carried hundreds, cracking a passcode secure under the latest cryptographic protocols, and even building his own computer from raw metals.

Some UMD Engineering majors might question how Ding accomplished these feats, unusual for even the average undergraduate, by the age of 12. To these voices of doubt, Ding affirmed, “You’re right. No one my age should be able to do this. I stretched the truth like bubble gum.” With a mischievous grin, he then revealed his exaggerations in totality. His aircraft was a paper airplane with millions of microorganisms attached. His heroic decryption covered the process of unlocking his locker with a key. In touch with today’s technology, his computer was constructed in the video game Minecraft and copied from a YouTube video. The crown jewel of Ding’s deceptions is a maneuver familiar to UMD students: Ding listed his graduation year as 2025, despite being a 6th grader 3 years away from receiving his middle school diploma in cap and gown. “I could technically drop out, get my GED, and probably go to Harvard,” explained Ding.

The most perilous step during Ding’s job hunt process happened when his baby tooth fell out in the middle of an interview. In a flash of wisdom beyond his years, Ding calmly covered it as a wisdom tooth. He received the offer after, in his own words, some “adult bonding” over this experience. “The interviewer kept rambling about how his wisdom teeth removal surgery was, in fact, a surgery… And I just kept nodding,” recalled Ding.

When asked about his career plans, Ding said resolutely, “I want to get into Harvard. This is my childhood dream. I think the NASA internship will prepare me well for the SAT and my AP Physics courses, in addition to strengthening my application.”

Ding’s friends are still trying to figure out how he skipped gym class last week without getting caught. Little do they know that Ding’s greatest escape plan wasn’t ditching dodgeball, but breaking into the world of astronomy before hitting puberty.

When asked if he had any advice for fellow aspiring interns, Ding replied, “Just pretend you know what you’re doing. It works for adults all the time.”

Image Credits: Joseph Kleinman