18-year-old girl wins best graduating student award in high school, bags $4.5m scholarship to study in 113 US universities

Aylah Brick also noted that her achievement not only saw her win a $4.5m scholarship award to 113 universities but also made her the first-ever person in her family to attend university.

“A FIRST GENERATION COLLEGE STUDENT. A RECIPIENT OF OVER 4.5 MILLION IN OFFERS. A 2021 GATES SCHOLAR WITH 113 COLLEGE ACCEPTANCES,” she said.

Aylah Brick praised her mother for being a strong force behind her success. She described her mother as the main driving force behind all her accomplishments.

“I think the main driving force behind these accomplishments has to be my mother. Just seeing her tireless effort of always taking the time out to read me a story, or teach me something new as a child,” she told 11Alive.

She narrated that her days in high school were tough as she was bullied severally by other students but did not let that stop her from achieving her goals. “I was often bullied and I didn’t understand why, but when you’re bullied…people see something in you that they don’t see in themselves,” she said.

Faced with the choice of choosing one of the 113 universities that offered her admission and scholarships, the young scholar narrowed her choice down to Clemson and Mercer University with a dream of majoring in behavioural neuroscience and legal studies with minors in communications and public health.

She later enrolled at Mercer University in Macon, Georgia and is set to graduate with a Bachelor’s degree in 2025.

“My story is not ending in Twiggs County, but it’s only just beginning. I think the most rewarding part is that I’ve made my family proud and I’ve made myself proud,” she said.