Kampton Carter graduated from Ventura College on May 19, 2023, earning four Associate of Art degrees. She’s acquired an Associate of Art degree in Liberal Studies, Associate of Art degree in Arts and Humanities, Associate of Art degree in Social and Behavioral Sciences, and an Associate of Art degree in Natural Sciences and Mathematics along with an Intersegmental General Education Transfer Curriculum (IGETC) Certification.
She attained Highest Honors with a 4.0 GPA after completing a total of 76 college credits as a part-time college student over the last four years while attending high school full-time. What makes this so unique is that she did this at the young age of 17 years old and before ever graduating from high school! On June 16, 2023, she completed her studies at El Camino High School with a 4.4 GPA and graduated summa cum laude as well.
Kampton has had a history of challenging herself from a very early age. Her second-grade year at Olivelands Elementary School, she began competing in spelling bees and placed third without studying the word list. It was then she discovered her orthographic skills and developed a love for words. In her pastime she would enjoy studying word origins, definitions and their parts of speech. By fourth grade she won her school’s spelling bee and advanced to the SAGE Ventura County Spelling Bee for the first time. For five consecutive years she was undefeated at the school level. During her 8th grade year, Kampton won the 2019 SAGE Ventura County Spelling Bee at the age of 13 for her final year of competition and advanced to the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C. where she competed with other finalists. Two weeks after the competition Kampton graduated from Briggs School as a valedictorian.
Kampton attended El Camino High School (ECHS) for all four years. ECHS has had a humble reputation for their exceptional independent studies program. The program enables students a dual-enrollment opportunity by allowing students to take a maximum of 11 units per semester at local community colleges while concurrently attending high school.
She has enjoyed many extracurricular activities throughout high school despite the restrictions of the pandemic and rigorous schedule. She competed in Poetry Out Loud, Ventura County Poetry Project, Optimist Club Essay Contests, Lions Club Speech Contests, Knowledge Bowl Competitions, Geo Challenge Competitions, completed a Pre-Engineering Program at the Port Hueneme Naval Base, participated in Journalism Club as well as Political Discourse Club at ECHS, took equestrian lessons, violin lessons, played soccer for AYSO for the first time her senior year, and interned at Community Access Partners of San Buenaventura (CAPS Media) where she learned the skills to conduct interviews, use video editing software, and operate camera/studio equipment. In fact, Kampton along with her peers and mentor Phil Taggart recently won four Western Access Video Excellence (WAVE) awards for interviews at Ventura’s only local broadcasting station.
Kampton will be attending Pepperdine University in the fall and plans to double major for Bachelor of Arts degrees in Communications as well as International Studies. She will be part of Pepperdine’s selective Regent Scholars Program.
