Boy Bound for College Packs a Lot of Living, Learning Into 11 Years

Most people haven’t accomplished in 40 years what Jaime McEnnan has in his 11.

The freckled Agoura Hills boy has been teaching the illiterate how to read since he was 8, acted on television’s “General Hospital” and will soon enter college. A environmentalist and social activist, Jaime devours more than a book a day, understands Latin and was once chased by a lion in Africa.

This fall he’ll be the youngest student enrolled at Moorpark College and has the goal of taking every science course it offers. That’s 112.

“It’s going to be really neat because I’m going to be a student and a teacher at the same time,” he said, pointing out that he will still be teaching others how to read.

His 15-year-old sister--at camp in Minnesota this month boning up on her Russian--entered Moorpark at 13. His father is a physicist and his mother was a Fulbright scholar who was involved in anthropological work in Romania in the 1970s. She now spends much of her time running a children’s theater group in Culver City and monitoring her own children’s activities.

Stacey McEnnan, 40, resists the idea that her son is some kind of wonder child.

“I think everybody ought to be busy doing interesting things,” she said. “I never thought of us as being extraordinary. Just busy.”

And busy he is. On Mondays, he’s off to acting and fencing lessons. Tuesdays he learns math through the Japanese Kumon method. He takes painting lessons on Wednesdays, and on Thursdays and Fridays he rides horses and fences. Every other Sunday, he rehearses with his mother’s Peace Child Repertory Theatre, which addresses problems such as racism, AIDS and inner-city violence.

And he averages more than 40 books a month, mostly science fiction and history. “Half the time I’m in the car, so I read then,” he explained.

On Saturdays, he said with a smile, he sleeps in and watches cartoons.

In an oversized purple T-shirt and plastic yellow thongs, Jaime--short for his age with a mop of brown hair--arrived at his art class in Agoura Hills one morning this week carrying supplies under his arm. He speaks about each of his talents fluently but with a certain degree of humility.

“They don’t treat me like I’m a special kid,” he said of his family and friends. “I have my best subjects and my worst. I don’t go out saying I’m smarter than everybody. I’m just a normal kid, except (for) college.”

Jaime and his mother attribute his academic advancement to their refusal to be restricted by public and private school systems.

At age 4, he began kindergarten and worked through grade three in one year. Skipping fourth grade, he completed the next four grades in two years before he and his mother decided to begin classes at home. He hopes to get his high school equivalency degree by next June.

Jaime took the college entrance exams when he was 9. Although his mother doesn’t want to share his scores, her son “did very well,” she said.

Unlike some child prodigies whose parents have mapped out their entire careers, Jaime claims his goals are his own.

“My parents didn’t say, ‘We want him to be a doctor; let’s get him through college,’ ” he said. “It was my idea and my mom let me.”

His mother adds, “I think kids are like adults.” And at Moorpark, she said, “they talk to him as if he’s a human being instead of a child, which is refreshing.”

Muthena Naseri, an environmental science professor who taught Jaime during a trial college course in the spring, said the boy worked well with other students and demonstrated the ability to grasp the course work.

He’s a “likable young lad. Well-disciplined, well-adjusted. He doesn’t stand out because he’s so cool,” Naseri said.

Jaime still expresses a childlike uncertainty about his goals.

“There are about 50 different things I want to do,” he said. “I can’t choose one of them.”

One that sounds good, though, is combining his art and science interests to become a marine biologist and zoologist who produces animal documentaries.

His teachers and others say he will succeed no matter what he decides to do. He does not appear to be headed toward adolescent burnout because he is so multifaceted, they said.

Dorothy Day Otis, who manages his acting career, said that if he decides to continue performing, he will do well. He has already played the role of “Skeeter,” the son of a wheelchair-bound mother on “General Hospital,” and has done commercials for Apple Jacks and Holiday Inn.

“To me, he is best for parts that call for gentleness, that call for insight, that call for deep feeling,” Otis said.

His biggest weakness? Said Otis: “Goodness, I’ve never been aware of one.”