His heroes? His mother and his father. His ? To be a software programmer. In ten years he sees himself running his own software business, "fuelled" by his "very own ideas." He has many ideas: he's one of Mysore, India's smartest students, having scored in the upper percentiles of a standardized exam given to identify academically students. But while 13-year-old Jamal's ambition and intellect are his biggest assets, he faces a challenge that poses greater imposition on his future than if he lived in the United States-his family makes $60 a week.

Jamal is one of an estimated 13 million students who make up India's "smart fraction," or the top 3% in ability for students less than 15 years of age.

Jamal says his parents "supervise [him] lightly" in his studies, in sharp contrast with the stereotype that Asian parents highly control their children's academic pursuits.

He's not the first Indian student with intellectual and professional ambition. From 1995 to 2005, 15 percent of Silicon Valley startups were initiated by Indians. Indian immigrants have founded famous Silicon Valley firms such as Brocade (Kumar Malavalli), Cirrus Logic (Suhas Patil), Hotmail (Sabeer Bhatia), and Sun Microsystems (Vinod Khosla) just to name a handful.

India's famous Indian Institutes of Technology attract and develop a huge portion of the country's smart fraction, however this is at the college level. Offerings for younger students are not as systematic. In addition, some are concerned that India may not have many initiatives, resources, or a strategic national plan to develop its gifted and talented children.

So what did Jamal do last summer?

He was at Duke TIP's Summer Studies in India program, one of several programs designed to bring academically-talented students together to study challenging course material.

Jamal says that the program has made him "aware of the " he will face beyond high school. Do American students give thought to the competition that they will face beyond high school?

Bill Carrico, founder of several tech companies in Silicon Valley said "When I was eleven years old I knew I was going to be an engineer. I dare you to find an eleven-year-old in America who wants to be an engineer today. We've turned down the ambition level."

Similarly, Bill Gates, in his 2009 annual letter from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, wrote "I felt I belonged in the software business, having thought about the engineering and the business possibilities maniacally from age 13."

Jamal says that he sees himself running his own software business in 10 years. How many American 13-year-olds today would say the same?

We don't have the answer to that question, but as Thomas Friedman has written: "When I was growing up, my parents told me 'Finish your dinner. People in China and India are starving.' I now tell my daughters, 'Finish your homework. People in India and China are starving for your job.'"

Perhaps American students should give thought to their competition around the world: on average, American students have not fared well on tests from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) which compares national performance on math, science, and reading among 65 countries. Asian countries such as China, Japan, Korea, and Singapore have been dominant in recent comparisons. But what about India?

India's students will participate in the PISA for the first time this December, giving the world the opportunity to see how its second-largest country performs against other students globally.

We are hopeful that America's youths understand not only the competition they will face after high school and college, but the necessary for success in an ever-flattening world. Perhaps educators will continue to make greater efforts programmatically to bring together the brightest students from countries like India and America to foster this collaboration. And maybe through collaboration, students like Jamal-whose station in life has likely shaped his ambition and work ethic-will be more able to bring their unique insight to solving critical world challenges.

© 2011 by Jonathan Wai and Campbell Vogel.

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We thank Mara Shurgot, Duke TIP Director of International Programs, for her help with research and feedback for this article. The student named "Jamal" in this article is not the boy in the initial photo.