Student who started company dedicated to stopping gun violence accepted into 25 top universities

WASHINGTON -- A 17-year-old student in Washington D.C. has been accepted into more than 24 top universities.

It's pretty obvious why. RuQuan Brown has a 3.9 GPA, a 1320 SAT, is a champion football player and owns his own business.

"Harvard, Columbia, Penn, Yale, Princeton, Holy Cross, Georgetown. It just kind of skyrocketed and we're already at 24," Brown told ABC7 in Washington.

His business is called Love1. Its mission is to end gun violence.

"My stepdad was murdered in 2018," Brown said. "I had a teammate who was murdered and he wore number one."

Love1 is a clothing line that donates 20 percent of the money it makes to an organization in New Jersey that buys guns through a police sanctioned buy back program and turns them into art.

"No matter how much money you have, no matter how you look or smell, gun violence can impact your life. The thing is, my family didn't allow gun violence to negatively impact us," Brown said.

To get to this point in his life, Brown said he's had help.

"The head of my village is Jesus Christ, and then my mom, dad, my stepdad like I talked to you about, and my grandparents are all super important. And they keep me encouraged, but I also have eight siblings," Brown said.