Genius 12-Year-Old Attending Arizona State University, Plans To Work For NASA

A 12-year-old prodigy from Arizona is the perfect example of how one is never too young to do big things.

Alena Wicker has graduated high school before even turning 13 -- acing all her classes while she was at it. After being accepted into Arizona State University, the young genius will start her college classes this summer, double majoring in astronomical and planetary science and chemistry, local news outlet WAGM-TV reported.

According to Wicker, her main goal is to eventually land a job at NASA as an engineer when she graduates from college in four years.

“I just had a goal that I wanted to get to,” the 12-year-old said. “I always dreamed of being an engineer because, throughout my life, I liked building.”

Wicker's passion for building began when she was an infant playing with Lego.

“At 4 years old, she said, ‘Mommy, I’m going to work for NASA, and I’m going to go up there.’ She would point to the stars,” said Daphne Mcquarter, Alena's mother.

“She just had a gift for numbers and Legos and science, so I started nurturing that gift,” she continued of her daughter.

If all goes according to plan, Wicker will finish her degrees at the age of 16 and head straight to the space agency in the same year. The young prodigy shared that part of her dream is to build rovers similar to NASA's Mars Perseverance, which safely landed on the red planet in February.

“I’ll be driving one of those future space mobiles by the time I graduate college,” Wicker said. “It doesn’t matter what your age is or what you’re planning to do. Go for it, dream, then accomplish it.”

Alena Wicker is determined to build her online presence in the meantime, and part of achieving it is by starting her own podcast.

NASA's Mars Perseverance rover touched down on Mars on Feb. 18 after its 292.5 million-mile journey from Earth at a region believed to contain signs of ancient life -- the Jezero Crater.

With the objective of searching for evidence of ancient microbial life, Perseverance will be scouting the surface of Mars to gather samples that will be brought back to Earth for study through another mission in the future.