Kansas Boy, 16, Is Set to Graduate in the Spring From High School — and Harvard

In many ways, Braxton Moral seems a lot like other teenagers. Most days, he goes to sleep around 11 p.m. and wakes up around 7 or 8 a.m. He likes to play video games, particularly World of Warcraft. He hangs out with his friends and goes to the movies. But the similarities between Braxton and most other teenagers end there. In May, Braxton is set to graduate from high school in Ulysses, Kan., and, just days later, from Harvard University. He hopes the bachelor’s degree he earns will pave the way for admission to Harvard Law School in the fall and ultimately a career in national politics, and maybe one day, the presidency. “I’ve been going to Harvard now half as long as I’ve been going to regular school, so it’s really become a part of my life,” Braxton, 16, said on Saturday. “To see the conclusion and the results and the rewards of that, it’s a really an exciting prospect for me.” From the time he was in middle school, Braxton has been studying at Harvard’s extension school, mostly taking classes online. His concentration was in government, with a minor in English. Early signs of Braxton’s advanced intellect came when he was a toddler, his mother, Julie Moral, said. She said the family would take him to his siblings’ school volleyball games and at the age of 2 or 3, he would sit in the bleachers and calculate the mathematical differences in the scores. Still, Ms. Moral said they did not realize how advanced he was partly because Braxton was the youngest of four children. He has a brother who is 10 years older and two sisters 12 years older. When members of the Moral family had conversations, they would usually speak as adults and Braxton would blend right in. Elementary school administrators alerted Braxton’s parents to his high test scores and he skipped fourth grade. It was exciting to experience Braxton’s intelligence, Ms. Moral said. But even as he progressed faster than other children, he also grew depressed. While Braxton was still in elementary school, his parents were contacted by the Duke University Talent Identification Program, a nonprofit organization that helps gifted students. “They said he was having existential depression,” Ms. Moral said. “It’s where you’re like, ‘What’s my purpose? Is there a God?’ It’s something that most people have — a midlife crisis. He had it like, in fifth grade.” The program said he needed to be stimulated. When Braxton’s father was researching potential options, he learned about the Harvard Extension School, Ms. Moral said. Braxton said he tried some Harvard computer science courses first, which didn’t appeal to him. Then in the summer after eighth grade, he took a Harvard writing course in which he wrote three essays: one about Watergate; another about the Supreme Court building’s architecture and history; and a third about President Ronald Reagan and the former Iranian leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. The course ignited his passion for government. For the next several years, Braxton took both high school and Harvard courses. He went to Harvard’s campus in the summers after his sophomore and junior years in high school. Other times he took courses online. Sometimes it would be a challenge, Ms. Moral said. In one instance, Ms. Moral said Braxton had to take Harvard classes on an iPad in between tennis matches at high school. This school year, Braxton had to miss high school debate classes so he could come home on Friday mornings to take online courses for Harvard. “It’s a bit of a juggling act, but everybody works together to do it,” she said. Braxton said that he was aware he was different from other children because of his advanced studies but tried to downplay that difference and socialize as much as possible. “I’m a really ambitious person,” he said. “I think it’s important to have goals and achieve those goals, and it’s important to be charismatic and likable. You want to be relatable.” He said he occasionally watches motivational videos and was particularly inspired by Elon Musk and Conor McGregor, the Ultimate Fighting Championship superstar who has espoused the concept of “the law of attraction,” which states that whatever you experience in life is a direct result of your thoughts.