It’s four times the celebration!
The famed Ohio “Wade quadruplets” celebrate graduating together from Yale University, the Daily Mail reports.
Ohio quadruplet brothers Zachary, Aaron, Nick, and Nigel Wade, grew up in Liberty Township. Their parents, Darrin and Kim Wade, conceived them through a fertility procedure and the brothers made history as just one of 512 sets of quadruplets born in the country in 1999. Growing up, they became known as The Quads or the Wade brothers. They shared pretty much everything school, friends, and sports – yhey always stuck together.
Photo Courtesy of Kim Wade/Facebook
The brothers first made headlines after revealing that all four of them had been accepted to Harvard and Yale.
“Honestly, to have one child from a family be accepted to a school like this is amazing. But for all four to be accepted — I just don’t, I don’t know how it happened,” Zachary shared with reporters at the time.
Photo Courtesy of Kim Wade/Facebook
They decided collectively on Yale University, their father saying it boiled down to the most impressive financial aid package.
“Yale won. They made the best offer, and it was the benchmark for my sons,” said Darrin.
“Not only that, but the alumni reached out and made themselves available to us as a family. I had people I didn’t know calling and saying, we want your sons there, and they are going to be sure they are taken care of,” he added.
During move-in day, the twins became a part of the largest Yale freshman class in history and became the University’s second set of quadruplets. The brothers said they were looking forward to what’s in store for them.
Photo Courtesy of NAACP Now/Facebook
“I’m really excited to meet all sorts of interesting people…(and) becoming part of the vibrant and diverse community that is Yale,” Aaron told NBC News. “Ultimately, I’m looking forward to beginning this new chapter of my life with my brothers at my side.”
Now, the 22-year-olds are preparing to graduate, revealing that their time at Yale allowed them to really explore life as individuals instead of a collective and grow into whom they wanted to be, sometimes only seeing each other a couple of times a semester.
“In high school, we all knew the same people. So in a sense, that didn’t allow us to divert as much as we might’ve wanted to. But in college, because there’s so many different types of people, and we had so many different diverse interests, I think we were able to carve our paths in our own way,” Nick said.
Each of the Wade brothers picked a different area of study and extracurricular activities, eventually developing separate groups of friends.
Nick majored in political science, minored in Arabic, and spent his time working with refugees and immigrants. On the other hand, Aaron double majored in computer science and psychology, becoming musical director of a cappella group. Zach also became a double major in chemical engineering and economics, serving as president of the National Society of Black Engineers. And Nigel went pre-med, majoring in molecular, cellular, and developmental biology.
The four were so preoccupied that during their whole undergraduate experience, there was only one occasion that any of them shared a class, Aaron and Nigel both being enrolled in a 2,000-person psychology lecture course.
“I wouldn’t just be walking on the street and just be like, ‘Oh hey, there’s my brother.’ When that happened, I would be shook. I’d be like, ‘Oh my God, I completely forgot that you go to this school.’ For a long time, it felt like we were all a singular collective unit of a protagonist in the same show. But since going to Yale, it was just cool to brag like, ‘Oh, I have three brothers, and they’re all so smart and talented,'” said Aaron.
The four celebrated their graduation last month with their parents at a pizza spot in New Haven. The four are getting ready to separate after graduation and preparing to take the world by storm.
Nick and Zach both landed jobs at Goldman Sachs, Nick heading to New York City while Zach goes to San Francisco. Nigel will be staying in New Haven for two more years to participate in a research program in a Parkinson’s disease lab before heading to medical school. Meanwhile, Aaron is staying in New Haven for one more semester to complete his senior thesis, graduating in December before heading to New York City to work at Google.
Despite charting their paths, Nigel said it is still great to know his brothers are never too far away.
“It’s a safety net that you already always know is there, and you know you’ll always have people to support you. There’s probably no one else on the planet who understands me better than my brothers. You know that there’s someone who’s going to be in your corner.”
We are so proud of you all. We wish you nothing but the best in your future endeavors!
(l to r) Aaron, Nick, Zach, and Nigel Wade. Photo Courtesy of Kim Wade/Facebook