Several of Kent's friends who worked with her at the Crimson Sports Grille, where Kent was a waitress, traveled to Sarasota for the service and visited a stretch of beach she had frequented.

Over the holidays, Kent and her family had enjoyed the water and warm climate.

"She got me out on the jet-ski, which I had never done before," her father said. "But the next thing she wanted to power-sail. She was always on the go."

Though Kent was not enrolled in a degree program, her father said she had hoped to enter the College and go on to get a Ph.D. to give her the formal training she would need to be in education and speech therapy.

Kent's childhood passion was horseback riding. Her father said the family even relocated so she could raise a horse, after a surprising first performance when she was five.

"[The trainer] said, 'Oh, she's too young.' And lo and behold there she went," he said. "She was born to be a rider."

In the recent years, Kent had attended a number of schools.

After a year at Goucher College, Kent attended the University of Florida for a semester, then Boston College for one term before coming to the Extension School this fall.