Do what my parents did when I got suspended for "hacking": 1) Get him a new computer (but with a crappy video card, if he's into gaming) 2) Find him programmi

Do what my parents did when I got suspended for "hacking": 1) Get him a new computer (but with a crappy video card, if he's into gaming) 2) Find him programming internships and introduce him to programmers you know I would also add: Tell him that he isn't a real programmer unless he understands Prolog, Haskell, C, and a flavor of Lisp (Scheme/Arc), although Python might be a good first language to start with. Be prepared to spend lots of $ on books - all of these topics have books which work for different people. I would recommend: The Little Schemer series: http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/matthias/BTLS/ http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/matthias/BTLS/ and Programming in Haskell http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~gmh/book.html http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~gmh/book.html These are solidly good books, there are others, but they really depend on personality.