Meet the world's smartest tween: girl genius with higher IQ than Einstein

Most parents think their child is a

genius, but Alison and David Cowie's daughter really is smarter thanEinstein. Their 11-year-old daughter Victoria scored 162 on an official IQ test, two points higher than the father of modern physics. "We were amazed," Alison Cowie tells Shine. "To us Victoria is just a normal kid who likes doing normal kid things."

Victoria is obsessed with Lady Gaga, jumping on her trampoline, and poring through Harry Potter books. But she also plays five different instruments, finishes crossword puzzles in record time and has the reading ability of someone twice her age. "As soon as she started nursery school at age three we were told by her teacher that she had a reading ability of a 7-year-old," explains Alison who runs a U.K. health consulting firm with her husband, David. Not only was Victoria an exceptional reader at age three, she could do it backwards. "We were sitting in a restaurant and she said 'you can't feed the swans in here'," recalls Alison. "So we asked her how she knew this and she said 'because it says so on the door'.When we looked there was a sign on the outside glass door that she had read backwards."

When she entered elementary school in her hometown of Wolverhampton, Victoria excelled at every subject from math and science to English and even gym class. Last month, she took an official Mensa test and within days received a note from the organization's honorary British president Sir Clive Sinclair, stating she's received one of the highest scores on record.

To earn acceptance to the Mensa organization, a prestigious network of international geniuses, you must receive a test score in the 98th percentile of the general population. Victoria, like Charles Darwin and Rene Descartes, is in the top percent of the top two percent, according to the Daily Mail.

"I didn't tell [my friends] initially because I didn't want to sound like I was bragging," says Victoria. But it wasn't long before her friends, and the entire country were clued in on her unique talents.

"It has been incredible how much publicity she has received," says mom Alison, who was busy all day shuffling her daughter to various television interviews. "Victoria is a very relaxed laid, back child and even though she has had all this media attention she is just taking it all in her stride."

Young prodigies are rare, but in theMensa organizationthey're part of the landscape. "We've got members who are 3 years old and we've got members who are 100," says Elissa Rudolph, National Chair of American Mensa. With over 2000 members under 18 in the U.S. branch, Rudolph is seeing the average age of members dropping.

"We have an increase in young people overall, in part, because of the internet," she explains. "There's mention of Mensa on a sitcom and before it's off the air it's all over Twitter and Facebook." Internet geniuses like Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates, are also giving brains good P.R. "You used to be teased if you were smart, but now it's more widely accepted," says Rudolph. "Technology is really advancing our cause."

Gender is still thebiggest imbalancein the genius organization. On average, 67 percent of members are male, but Cowie's entry may be an early marker of a sea change.

"There isn't the stigma for young girls in science that there was 30 years ago," says Rudolph. "When I was in school it seems like even if the young girls were interested in science and math, teachers gravitated toward teaching the boys...I think that's changed a lot."

Victoria Cowie can attest to that. She's been offered scholarships to several top schools in England to pursue her passion for science. "I would love to be a vet because I love animals and I enjoy science at school," she says. "However I would settle for running Disneyland if I could go on all the rides and dine with Mickey Mouse."

Clearly, she's still living by a healthy dose of kid philosophy. That's something her parents want to keep percolating for a while. They're not planning to fast track her schooling far past her age level.

"We believe that enjoying school is just as important as getting good results so we won't be putting any pressure on her to fast track qualifications at the expense of missing out on being a kid and enjoying school life," says Alison. "You only get one chance at education and you only get one chance at childhood so you need to keep the right balance."

Sometimes even geniuses need help keeping the balance. "Yes," adds Alison, "like any parent we have to remind her to do her school home work."

Related:
Are Chinese parents really the best parents?
How to guide your kid to excellence
How to raise a genius
Why I'm glad my kids aren't prodigies
The great Baby Einstein scam