Clawson Middle School student, 12, taking calculus classes at OCC
The 12-year-old is so precocious at math that he is currently taking his second calculus class at Oakland Community College.
Ian is a sixth grade student at Clawson Middle School, but for the last hour of his day, he attends OCC math classes online in a separate room.
“He started OCC classes at the beginning of this year,” Ian’s mom, Rebecca, said. “He actually finished Calculus I while he was still 11 years old and in sixth grade.”
Ian’s brain has always been wired for math.
“When I was really young, like 2 years old, I came across this toy cash register that also doubled as a calculator,” he said. “I looked at it and mashed a couple of buttons and I asked, ‘Wait, how did the numbers get there?’ So, I just kept on mashing and typing, and eventually I just figured out how addition, subtraction and multiplication and division worked. And from there on I was obsessed.”
Ian’s parents said their first memory of him being a math wiz was during a road trip.
“I think he was about 4 years old, so not even in kindergarten, we were going to Port Huron and I had my phone up there with the navigation, and at one point he asked how long until we get there, and I looked at my phone and said 13 minutes,” Rebecca Konkolesky said. “I heard him in the back, sort of thinking, whispering to himself, and he comes back and says, ‘That’s 780 seconds.’”
Rebecca Konkolesky has a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Wayne State University, and father Bill Konkolesky is the academic testing coordinator at Oakland Community College. Ian also has a 14-year-old sister, Alex, who is an honors student herself.
“I have a degree in mathematics myself, but I never really pushed it on the kids too much. He just sort of picked it up,” Rebecca Konkolesky said. “He’s been self-driven. It’s all YouTube, and books, but mostly YouTube that he’s gotten into and he’s figured it all out.”
Rebecca Konkolesky said that she grew up in a mathematical household herself and has always been enamored by the clear-cut nature of math, but never wanted to force her kids to pursue it.
“I didn’t want to force it on anyone. … Sometimes I would play math games with the kids but never really pushed any kind of higher math onto them,” she said.
Ian said his favorite math so far is Calculus II, which he is currently enrolled in at OCC. He said he is learning about summation, integration and differential equations.
“I just like math,” he said. “I’m proud of myself for being at such a high level at such a young age.”
Belle Kimmel, Ian’s Calculus II teacher at OCC, said that the 12-year-old thinks in a way that isn’t the same as other students.
“My students submit notes after watching course videos, writing down the steps they take to solve a problem,” Kimmel said in an OCC press release. “The steps that Ian writes are not typical. He uses a different angle, which I find interesting.”
Rebecca Konkolesky said that she is particularly grateful for the Clawson teachers that have been assisting her son through this time.
“Last year when he was in elementary school, he was given the opportunity to test out of every class up through calculus,” she said. “It was really because of the administrators at the Clawson Schools that he was able to do that. … This was such an unusual thing and they really went to bat for him.”
Rebecca Konkolesky said that she and Bill asked the school if they could accommodate his abilities in fifth grade.
“In fifth grade, he was basically taking sixth grade math, and he was bored out of his mind,” she said. “They kind of set him aside and had him do ninth grade ingenuity, and he was bored with that. So then we were just like, ‘What can we do?’ and they said he could try to test out because he really wanted to take calculus, so it was totally him driving it, and he did the work and tested out of everything.”
When Ian is not studying math, he said a hobby of his is baking.
“I make brownies, ice cream, scones, cookies. I am actually going to make brownies tomorrow,” he said.
The future for Ian is bright, and his mother predicts that by the time he is in college, he will be taking master’s-level math courses.
Ian said he is most likely going to pursue a degree in math, maybe focusing on engineering or architecture.
