12-year-old boy graduates from California college with 5 degrees

A 12-year-old boy graduated from a California college last week, setting the school record as its youngest graduate. 

Clovis Hung enrolled at Fullerton College in California when he was nine years old, inspired by a 13-year-old who graduated from the school. Now, at 12, he graduated on May 20 with five associate degrees—History, Social Science, Social Behavior and Self-Development, Arts and Human Expression, and Science and Mathematics—and a sixth one planned for next year.  

"I also wanted to be the youngest graduate. I didn't expect to beat him," Hung said.

Because Hung was very self-motivated and goal-oriented, his mother pulled him out of traditional schooling. 

“Clovis is super inquisitive, mature, diligent, self-disciplined, and highly motivated,” Hung’s mother, Song Choi, said in a statement. “He is also very curious and traditional public schools could not satisfy his curiosity, therefore, the best option was college.”

Hung was a special-admit student, which allowed the pre-teen to take courses at the school while at the same time completing a homeschool curriculum taught by his mother, explained the school’s Director of Campus Communications, Lisa McPheron. 

"We're an open-enrollment institution and students that are K through eight - so before graduating high school - they can actually come to Fullerton College under a special process called special admit," McPheron said.

Hung says he had a hard time adjusting because he was taking in-person college classes. However, support from his professors and classmates motivated him to push through. 

"When I had questions, I asked them and if they had questions, they'd ask me. They treated me like a little brother," Hung said.

“At first, I was a little worried about how he would relate to the other students given the age and developmental differences, however, those concerns were unfounded,” Fullerton Biology Professor Kenneth Collins said.

“ Clovis has been a great mixture of ‘kid’ and college student. He is mature enough that the other students take him seriously, but enough of a kid that they look after him like a younger brother and cheer him on.”

Hung was selected to be Senator for Associated Students for the next school year before applying to universities. He plans to follow a career either in aerospace engineering, piloting, or pediatrics.