10-year-old girl enters college in Henan

Zhang Yiwen, a 10-year-old girl from the city of Shangqiu, Central China's Henan province, has now registered as a freshman at the Shangqiu Institute of Technology. Scoring 353 in this year's college entrance exams, Zhang Yiwen has been admitted to the School of Information and Electronic Engineering at the college.

Accompanied by her parents, Zhang Yiwen registers at the registration desk at Shangqiu Institute of Technology, central China's Henan province, Sept 10, 2017. What makes the story more interesting is that Zhang never went to public school.

Chinese children are usually required to go through 9 years of education in primary and junior high school, then finish high school before they're allowed to take the college entrance exams. Zhang Yiwen was home-schooled by her parents. Her father runs a local training school in Shangqiu.

The girl took the college entrance exam for the first time in 2016 as a 9-year old. However, she only managed a disappointing score of 172, so her parents decided to wait until this year to try again. While an obvious prodigy, her first attempt at entering college as a 9-year old was viewed by some as a stunt.

Zhang Yiwen poses with her letter of admission at Shangqiu Institute of Technology, central China's Henan province, Sept 10, 2017.

Despite this, 10-year old Zhang Yiwen is now starting a 3-year program majoring in electronic information and engineering. Although she has been accepted by a junior college, her father says he expects his daughter will eventually be able to transfer to a different school to get her PhD in the future.