Remember when you were young, and your parents always had to force you to do your homework before you could go out and play?

That was never a problem for Calhoun High School's 2011-12 valedictorian, Kurt Brown.

"I like to be involved in everything," he said. "To be involved in sports and clubs, and everything after school, I felt like I had an obligation to get my work done first. It's just something that I had established from an early age, so when I got to high school, everything just fell into place. I was never really pushed to do better...it all just sort of happened on my own."

In addition to possessing the inner drive to escalate his grades to the top of his graduating class, Brown also finds the time during his studies to excel on the playing field as well.

"I play three sports every year," he said. "I always do football. During my freshman and sophomore years, I played basketball. In my junior and senior years I ran winter track and I've done spring track all four years."

If that wasn't enough, Brown still manages to find enough hours in the day to serve as president of the Calhoun chapter of the National Honor Society, in addition to being an active member of DECA, the school's business club. Brown is also being nominated by his football coach this year for Academic All-State and a Golden Letter.

Despite his natural inclination to succeed, Brown said he couldn't do it without the inspiration provided by his father, a chemical engineer, and his mother, who works in the admissions department at Hofstra University.

"They've both been very supportive throughout my school career," he said. "They were proud of the grades I was getting and they really helped me to balance things and drove me back and forth after school between sports practice and doing homework. They were always on top of me, making sure I stayed on schedule."

As for a specific college he'd like to attend after he graduates, Brown already has several prestigious schools he's interested in.

"I applied to Oxford University in England. That would be my first choice," he said. "University of Pennsylvania, Rice University in Houston and the University of Virginia are also schools I'm looking at."

While not decided on what path he'd like his career to take yet, Brown is currently entertaining thoughts of entering the biology or the business fields. However, this bright young man is hoping that jumping right into college with both feet will enable him to aggressively feel things out until he's made up his mind.

"A lot of the schools on my list are big, so they should give me the opportunity to figure it out," he said. "Hopefully by this time next year, I'll have figured it out and those schools will give me the flexibility to make a decision later on."

In the end, Brown offers an important piece of advice to kids just coasting through school – a piece of advice that may enable them to not only enjoy the experience more, but to succeed as he has done.

“The most important thing is to be involved with the things you like to do,” he said. “Don’t go home at 2:15 and just do your homework, because you miss out on so much. You’re not really getting an experience out of it. Play a sport or join a club or do something you like to do. You can have fun at high school if you get involved.”