According to USA Today report, 14-year-old Alena McQuarter is set to graduate in December with a bachelor’s degree in biomedical biological sciences with a minor in global health.
If that’s not enough, she plans to immediately go back for her masters, and has already made history as the youngest Black person to be accepted into med school and NASA youngest intern.
The feats come after she a bit of opposition from her fifth-grade principal who once told her “young girls of color can’t get good grades or pass state tests,” according to a previous interview with the outlet.
“It did kind of hurt because I worked hard to get the grades that I got,” she said. “Someone comes and tells you, ‘You can’t do this because you’re too young or you’re a girl of color.’ I really wanted to show her that I can get good grades and I can go on and do amazing things. So I’m proving that.”
She added: “In the future, I want to look into health care and underrepresented communities,” she said, according to the outlet. “I just want to learn more and be able to develop different things to help … increase health care in underrepresented communities and advocate for people.”
In addition to her stellar academic achievements, McQuarter founded an organization called STEMGirl that aims to help “girls of color who want to study science, technology, engineering and math.”