In a Class by Herself : Revital Elitzur Is a Freshman in College. So Why Does Her Mother Still Take Her to School?

Last fall, as an entering freshman at UCLA’s School of Engineering, Revital Elitzur maintained her A average. In her whole life, she’s never received a grade of lower than A. In her intermediate calculus course she earned herself an A-plus, and her professor tried to recruit her as a math major. In Biology 5 and Chemistry 11A, courses for engineering majors only, she received A’s, having no previous academic experience in either science. Her biggest struggle was with freshman English, because she learned English only four years ago, when she moved to the United States from Israel. Her first English papers received Bs, but she rewrote each of them two or threes times and finally received a grade of A-minus in English, which pleased her.

The large size of many of her classes never intimidated her. When she had questions that neither her fellow students nor the teaching assistants assigned to her could answer, she scheduled appointments with her professors themselves, all of whom took quick personal interest in her.

She cannot understand how students who live in dormitories can study. Her older brother, Eran, soon to graduate in premed from UC Santa Barbara, could never study in the music- and beer-filled dorms at the University of Virginia, from which he transferred to UCSB. Revital commutes every day from her family home in Camarillo, and, because she does not drive, her mother, Dina, drives her each way and spends the day at Powell Library, reading and waiting and occasionally sitting, on days when there are science demonstrations, through her daughter’s lectures. Each day mother and daughter share a brown-bag lunch. Dina hopes Eran will be admitted to UCLA’s medical school next fall so he can relieve her from chauffeuring.

Once, Revital’s father, Joshua, who took early retirement from the Israeli air force, described Revital to a recruiter from Stanford University, whom he met at a scientific conference in San Diego. The recruiter became interested because Stanford has a program for students like Revital. But Elitzur, an aerospace engineer, never pursued Stanford because he and his wife felt Revital should continue to live at home.

From her first school days, Revital was a superior student. In neighborhood schools in Israel, teachers used her as their aide and tutor. She learned piano at 6, composed at 9, skipped fourth grade. In her first year in school in Virginia, some students picked on her because of her broken English, but she won their respect when the school for gifted children she attended chose her as outstanding student. In junior high she competed successfully against high school seniors in state and regional math and French competitions. When her father was transferred to Thousand Oaks and she entered Camarillo High, she played varsity tennis and was named “most conscientious French student.”

Her academic adviser at UCLA, Prof. Michel Melkanoff, wanted her to enter the university even earlier, in the spring, well before her mid-June birthday, but she decided to finish her year at Camarillo High.

At UCLA, losing interest in genetics, she changed her major from bioengineering to computer science to pursue, perhaps, an interest in artificial intelligence. She has no computer and hopes that by next fall, when she takes her first computer courses, she’ll have an IBM PC of her own. Last summer, the only work she could find was baby-sitting or cleaning houses. She chose housework because it paid better. She has no social life at UCLA, does not date, has friends of both high school and college age, plans to work toward a Ph.D., and, because of her mature appearance, looks like any other UCLA student.

Last fall, a classmate in biology asked Revital about her mother. “Why is she here?”

“She drives me,” was the answer.

“Why?”

“I’m too young to drive.”

“How old are you?”

“Fourteen.”