Oregon State University student honoured on being selected as Goldwater Scholar

A third-year student in the Oregon State University Honors College has been named a 2023 Goldwater Scholar by the Barry Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Foundation.

Kimberly Truong of Portland, who attended Reynolds High School in Troutdale and is a student in OSU’s colleges of Engineering and Science, is OSU’s 18th Goldwater Scholar in the past decade, 13 of whom have come in the last five years. She is Oregon State’s 45th honoree overall since the program’s 1986 inception.

Truong, double majoring in computer science and mathematics, is one of 413 Goldwater Scholars selected from more than 1,200 students nominated by 427 academic institutions in the United States.

Sophomores and juniors studying natural science, engineering or mathematics are eligible for the scholarship. The Goldwater Scholarship is the top undergraduate award in the majors it covers, said LeAnn Adam, OSU’s Goldwater campus representative, and applicants must be planning a career in research.

Each recipient receives a maximum of $7,500 to use for any part of tuition, fees, books, and room and board for the 2023-24 school year not covered through support from other sources.

Truong intends to obtain a Ph.D. in machine learning and pursue a university faculty position that will allow her to conduct research at the intersection of machine learning and software engineering.

The Barry Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Foundation was established by Congress in 1986 in honor of Goldwater, a U.S. senator from Arizona for 30 years and the 1964 Republican nominee for president.

Goldwater was also a World War II veteran, a pilot who reached the rank of Air Force major general before retiring from the Arizona Air National Guard in 1967. He died in 1998 at age 89.