By Pam Adams From Journal Star

PEORIA — Antonette White is a senior and a sophomore.

This graduation season, she has two different gowns for two different graduation ceremonies, where she’ll receive two different diplomas.

White, 17, of Peoria, graduates from Illinois Central College on Saturday and from Dunlap High School on Sunday.

Dunlap’s class of 2016 will be the first to have commencement at Bradley University’s Renaissance Coliseum. But, for White, crossing the stage for an associate’s degree a day before high school graduation is an accident of dates. ICC’s graduation ceremony at the Peoria Civic Center happens to occur first.

White’s dual graduations weren’t planned, either. Taking college classes at ICC at night while she took high school courses during the day was something she just did.

“I didn’t see it as different. I just saw it as something I did after school.”

To be clear, White wasn’t part of increasingly popular programs designed to give high school students a head-start at college. She only took one dual-credit course during her high school career, she said. By her junior year, when Dunlap’s dual-credit courses opened to high school students, she already had taken most of them on her own at ICC.

White was what’s known in academia as dually-enrolled, meaning she was enrolled in high school and in the community college. Unlike dual-credit courses, there was no link between the two.

ICC’s Interim Provost Margaret Swanson said dual-enrollment is uncommon at the community college. “It has happened, but not to the tune of how Antonette did it. That’s rare.”

Tom Welsh, principal of Dunlap High School, has heard of another student who went to ICC and the high school at the same time. It happened before he became principal 10 years ago.

White’s grade-point average: 3.9 out of a possible 4.0 at Dunlap; 3.6 at ICC.

And yes, according to White, the admissions counselor at Illinois State University — which she plans to attend after taking a few more courses at ICC — was “shocked” to get her transcripts from a high school and a community college.

She also worked part time tutoring in ICC’s TRIO Program.

White began going to college even earlier than she began taking college courses. She began taking college courses at 13.

As an 8-year-old, growing up in the Cayman Islands, she’d tag along to night classes with her father, Anthony White, a college professor. She’d sit in the back and entertain herself while he taught.

By the time her father moved to Peoria to teach at ICC, it seemed natural to both of them for her to take the placement test that determines if she could handle college-level courses.

“There was never a specific plan,” he said.

Anthony White, a single father, was careful about the ICC classes he allowed her to take initially. She took basic classes such as math and English, before he allowed her to take courses with content she might not be ready for at such a young age. “That part was scripted,” he added.

Father and daughter spend summers in the Caribbean with relatives in Jamaica, the Bahamas or the Cayman Islands. White would split her time between the beach and the computer, taking online courses at ICC.

She’d also take classes instead of study halls at Dunlap, which enabled her to earn enough credits to complete high school graduation requirements in December.

For Antonette White, that just meant more time to take more courses at ICC. To her high school friends, it made her a role model.

“She’s the reason I graduated early,” said Taj Pierre-Louise, who also is in Dunlap’s class of 2016. “I had never thought about it before. But I figured if she could do it, I could do it.”

IMAGES:
Dunlap High School senior Antonette White steps up on the stage during commencement ceremony rehearsal Friday in the school’s gymnasium. When White steps up Sunday during the actual high school commencement to receive her diploma, it will be the day after her graduation from Illinois Central College. DAVID ZALAZNIK/JOURNAL STAR

Dunlap High School senior Antoinette White talks with classmates Friday as they ready for the start of commencement rehearsal in the school’s gymnasium. The graduation ceremony Sunday at Bradley University’s Renaissance Center will follow White’s Saturday graduation from Illinois Central College. DAVID ZALAZNIK/JOURNAL STAR

For more on this story go to: http://www.pjstar.com/news/20160513/peoria-teen-set-to-graduate-from-high-school-and-icc-in-span-of-two-days?page=3