Making history: Palm Springs High grad headed to UCLA after finishing school in 3 years

A Palm Springs High student will become the first in school history this June to graduate in three years with not just her high school diploma but two associate degrees from College of the Desert, as well. She’ll be attending UCLA in the fall.

Her life journey has been as impressive as her curriculum vitae.

Shelomith Hoy was born in the Philippines and moved to Chino Hills when she was 9. Her mother had been living in California for years to work as a registered nurse while Shelomith and her father stayed in the Philippines, waiting for U.S. immigration paperwork to process.

Call her part of the FaceTime generation.

“I don't really say that I grew up without a mom because we called every night,” she said. “I grew up during the evolution of Apple and FaceTime and all these apps we used to talk on.”

Some time after her family reunified in Chino Hills, the Hoys moved to the desert. Mom took a job as a nurse with Palm Springs Unified, and dad, whose business degree from the Philippines is not recognized in this country, took on jobs as a cook at local golf clubs. Currently, he works at The Springs in Rancho Mirage.

For Shelomith, the move to the desert was not an easy one.

After promoting from Saint Theresa Catholic School in Palm Springs, Hoy was set to start anew at Palm Springs High when — boom — life changed for everyone.

The COVID-19 pandemic arrived, and in-person classes went away.

Suddenly, Hoy’s opportunity to start fresh in public school went up in the air. The chance to plant roots with new friends changed from something tangible into a grid of digital pixels and faces on Zoom.

Hoy called the effects of the pandemic “devastating.”

“I would say that I was impacted most socially because I went into high school really knowing nobody, and I didn't have that opportunity to branch out and meet new people like I had wanted to,” she said.

Determined, Hoy went to great lengths to make friends.

“I joined all the clubs online,” she said. “I was in French Club. I never even took a French class.”

It was like throwing darts at the wall.

“I would say one of the most surprising things that I learned is there's a disparity between the connections you make online and in-person,” Hoy said. “This whole experience kind of really emphasized for me the value of connections and having strong relationships with the people that you surround yourself with.”

Eventually, Hoy found a place as a leader of the Rotary Interact Club, and she vowed not to skip quintessential in-person events like prom.

But even as her socializing picked up, it was her all-online freshman year that fundamentally shifted her high school trajectory. For its drawbacks, it also led her on a path to early graduation and dual enrollment at COD.

“I felt kind of stagnated in a way because I wasn’t able to branch out,” Hoy said. “I was planning on being thoroughly involved (socially), so I just decided to channel all of this nervous energy into the thing that I’d always excelled at the most — which is academics.”

Hoy knew a friend in Arizona on track to graduate from high school with her associate degree.

“And, so that’s where I got that idea,” she said.

By the end of her freshman year, Hoy had already logged college credit thanks to COD’s dual enrollment program, which allows high school students to earn college credit in classes taught by college-approved high school teachers.

Hoy’s first dual enrollment class was taught by Erin Graham, an English teacher renowned for her mentorship. 

“When I told her my motivations, she understood,” Hoy said of Graham. "She didn’t question it.

“Everyone who I ever shared my plans with always met me with such belief in my potential. They were confident in me, and they placed their faith in me,” Hoy added. “I feel like that's something that has really been like a springboard in terms of my achievement. I credit a lot of my accomplishments to the people who were behind me all of this time.”

Fast forward two years and Hoy’s accomplishments include associate degrees in economics and psychology from COD, six AP classes and a GPA of 4.6 at Palm Springs High.

Her declared major at UCLA is applied math, but Hoy admits she’s not quite sure what she wants to do with it.

“I can really use that to go into any field,” Hoy said.

Her resilience and determination will also be useful wherever she turns next.

​​Jonathan Horwitz covers education for The Desert Sun. Reach him at jonathan.horwitz@desertsun.com.

This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: Palm Springs High grad headed to UCLA after finishing school in 3 years