This 12-year-old — E’leese Shelton — is heading to college!
According to WCTV, E’leese graduated from Tallavana Christian School in Havana, FL, surrounded by supportive family.
“It’s just kind of surreal,” she explained, according to the outlet. “I believe it’s mostly because of my support system, like my friends, my mom, my church community.”
While to some, a 12-year-old accomplishing this feat may come as a surprise, it is not for E’leese’s mother, Danrell. When her daughter was just 2 years old, she already knew she was unique by how quickly she picked up learning on a LeapFrog tablet.
“I got her a LeapFrog tablet, and we didn’t know that she was self-taught until it was telling her to do the letters, uppercase, lowercase letters, and we didn’t realize that she knew all of it,” Danrell explained, according to WCTV. “I did not teach her any of it. She just had the LeapFrog, and she knew it.”
Additionally, E’leese continued to accelerate in learning, reading at the age of 3 and doing math just one year later. So it was already clear, she would have a bright future ahead, following in the footsteps of her brother, E’ven, who graduated high school at 16 years old.
“She told him that she was going to outdo him,” Fred Shelton, the children’s father, said, according to WCTV. “So she stuck to her word.”
E’ven commented, “The best thing that you could hope for for somebody that you love is for them to do something better than you. That’s just what we hope for the next generation.”
Looking ahead, E’leese plans to attend college at Tallahassee Community College, and then she will transfer to Florida State University. Her long-term goal is to become a pediatrician. So, she hopes to attend medical school by 16 or 17.
“I feel excited to go on and embrace that journey,” E’leese expressed to WCTV.
