It was a summer afternoon in Fukuoka. The AOGS annual meeting was in full swing – one of the biggest Earth science conferences in the Asia-Pacific region. The hall was packed with professors, postdoctor, and PhD students.

Among them was Declan. A 15-year-old from Yew Chung International School of Chongqing.

He was standing next to a poster board, waiting for people to stop by.

And they did come. One after another.

Declan, at School

Back at school, Declan is not a one-dimensional kid. He fiddles with 3D printers, volunteers with the Seeds of Hope project, joins competitions, and earned the YCIS Science Scholarship for 2026–27.

What makes YCIS work for him is simple: no one tells him to stop asking questions.

It Started Small

His interest in space began with Star Trek: The Next Generation – watching it with his dad.

"I wasn't really into science back then," he admits. "I just thought space was a place where you could think about big stuff."

The turning point came during a chat with Dr. Christopher Hurley, Head of Edfutures Division, YCYW Network. They talked about black holes, drifted into information theory, and Declan's mind lit up.

"That's when it stopped being a daydream," he says. "It became something I actually wanted to do."

But turning a daydream into a real research paper was not easy.

He went to his teachers with a rough idea – using AI to analyse Martian craters. They encouraged him, but also pushed him: test it properly, verify everything, write it up to survive scrutiny.

"The hardest part wasn't coding," he says. "It was when two different models gave me different results. I had to figure out why and explain it clearly. I rewrote that section many times. But I got there. None of this would have been possible without the guidance from YCYW EdFutures and professors from HKU, SYSU, and SCUT."

Behind him, his family quietly supported him. As the eldest of five siblings, Declan has become a bit of a legend at home – his brothers and sisters now see that passion and persistence can take you further than you ever imagined.

At the Conference

Walking into the conference centre, Declan felt the weight of it immediately. Posters everywhere. A packed schedule. A signing board full of "Professor" and "Dr."

He pinned up his poster and waited. The first few minutes felt long. Then someone stopped. Then another. Before long, he was in a steady flow of visitors.

He explained his work – AI-driven crater detection, error analysis, model comparisons – again and again. Each time, his confidence grew. Each time, listeners nodded.

Later, at the coffee break, he chatted with scientists from around the world. When they asked his age and he said 15, nearly everyone did a double-take.

"That experience," he says, "made me feel like the future is closer than I thought."

Back to Where It All Began

Declan is back now. If you see him in the hallway, he's still the same friendly kid – joking with friends, going to class, probably forgetting his homework now and then.

But something has quietly changed.

Other YCIS students are starting to believe that maybe those big, distant dreams aren't so distant after all. Maybe they can start right here – in a classroom, with a question, or a teacher who says "go for it."

Because Declan has shown them: you don't have to be a professor to stand among them. You just have to start.