Tennis legend graduates from college at age 82

Legendary American tennis player Billie Jean King, at the age of 82, fulfilled a long-standing wish and graduated from the University of California, which she left more than six decades ago to pursue a sports career.

1. Billie Jean King enrolled in history studies in 1961, but dropped out in 1964 to devote herself to her sports career.
2. Within just a few years, she had become one of the most successful professional tennis players in the history of the sport, winning 16 Grand Slam singles titles and another 11 in doubles.

She is a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Medal of Honor, and is known for her advocacy for gender equality and equal pay for women and men in sports, writes the Guardian.

Last year, she returned to the prestigious California State University in Los Angeles to finish what she started, and today she was presented with her diploma at a formal ceremony.

At the ceremony, she recalled her youth in a modest working-class family, with a housewife mother and a firefighter father.

"Like many of my fellow students, I am the first in my immediate family to graduate from college, just like many of you," King said.