by Justin Barton

January 15, 2020

Georgia Teen Accepted to 33 Colleges, Receives $900K in Scholarships

Kayla Willis was a senior at Westlake High School in Atlanta, Georgia, when she decided to apply to 41 colleges. She was able to get all of her application fees waived. She ended up getting accepted to 33 of the colleges that she applied to. Her high school places all acceptances of their students on a wall to showcase their achievements.

“They’re missing a few but I’m not going to complain or brag because I still have a lot underneath there,” Wills told 11 Alive News. 

Some of the schools that Willis was accepted include Spelman, Notre Dame, University of Georgia, among others. Willis was also able to secure over $900,000 in scholarships from the various universities that accepted her.

“I posted, turned off my phone, clocked into work and I just keep hearing a bing, bing, bing, bing, bing, bing, bing, bing,” she said. “And I’m like, what is going on? Am I going viral right now?”

Willis’ achievement became a hit on social media last year when she announced that she had scored 1160 on her SATs.

“To show them that someone who made an average SAT score who has good grades—someone can make it and do that type of thing,” she said.

Wills’ acceptance success had a positive effect on other students at her high school.

“It’s just been contagious and I’ve had so many students come up to me and say, ‘Hey, here’s my acceptances, I want to put them on the wall’,” Principal Jamar Robinson said.

“I wanted to inspire people and show them that you can actually dream big and get to where you want to go,” she said.

Wills chose to attend Fisk University, an HBCU, this past fall and major in International Business.


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