Twenty-four-year-old Samantha Silverman could win a gold medal if multitasking were an Olympic sport.

Silverman, novelist, secretary of Phi Theta Kappa and Jewish peer intern for Hillel, has earned three degrees and is being awarded one of UCLA‘s highest awards, the Regents Scholarship.

“There are some people who are here to have fun and that’s great,” Silverman said, “But for me I’m interested in the academics, and the honors program gave me a group of people to focus with.”

Despite her humble prediction, in two years she’s earned her Associate’s degree in English and Humanities and participated in the college’s honors program.

Next semester she will be at UCLA majoring in English.

Silverman grew up in Big Sur partially at the Esalon Institute, where her father was the director. Both of her parents were psychologists who home schooled her, making her upbringing alternative.

She also lived in Israel for four years where she finished her first book about a union worker who attains enlightenment with messages rooted in the Kabbalah.

This has been Silverman’s first time in “the formal education arena,” and has enjoyed her time especially because of the honor’s program, she said.

Besides studying during her time at City College she is also the co-creator of diversity month, a positive response to “the Compton cookout.” It was started after a frat in California mocked black history month and other hate incidents at Universities.

For holocaust remembrance day she brought in Judy Meisel, who is a holocaust survivor to speak at the Business Communications Forum. There was such a turnout that people had to sit in the isles.

She said that one of the difficulties she had was adjusting to life in America after returning from Israel.

“In Israel there is more of a focus on living day to day with a quality from a perspective from human interactions rather than possessions,” she said.

But she said her time in Santa Barbara has been wonderful and it will be hard to leave.

Silverman is currently working on her third novel,” the ashes of phoenix” and plans on finishing it while she is in LA.