Meet Julia Nepper, who earned a UW-Madison Ph.D. at 23

Pat Schneider:

A home-schooled child who started community college at age 11, Nepper said she hopes people will take the example from science of being willing to fail and move on to the next strategy and apply it to other areas of their lives.

Nepper’s phenomenal academic progress was captured along the way by reporters in Wilmington, North Carolina, but news of the latest milestone quickly spread much more widely on the internet. “I’ve had hundreds of people following me on Twitter and Instagram,” she said.

At UW-Madison, her age kept her out the “microbrewery scene” the first two years she was on campus, but otherwise had little impact, Nepper said.