Oak Ridge National Laboratory: L&N STEM Academy senior Tyler Duckworth receives UT-Battelle Scholarship

L&N STEM Academy senior Tyler Duckworth has been named recipient of the 2021 UT-Battelle Scholarship to attend the University of Tennessee.

The competitive scholarship is awarded annually to a graduating senior planning to study science, mathematics or engineering at UT and who has a parent employed by UT-Battelle, managing contractor of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The scholarship is renewable for up to four years and is worth a total of $20,000.

Duckworth is the son of Robert and Jamie Duckworth of Knoxville. Robert works in ORNL’s Fusion Energy Division.

Duckworth’s high school achievements include serving as team captain of the L&N STEMpunks Robotics Team and participating on the team since 2016. He has also taught fellow students about computer science and how to program robots using Java and Python.

From 2017 to 2018, Duckworth assisted in the planning of the Simple Summit demonstration unit, a result of a collaboration between a team from the L&N STEM Academy and the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility. Simple Summit demonstrates the power of parallel computing. He helped design custom pieces the unit needed to function.

Duckworth’s experience with STEM — science, technology, engineering and mathematics — curricula has inspired his academic and career ambitions.

“I plan to use my career in computer science to help expand the role that technology plays in community schools by making available low-cost options of reading, providing opportunities to learn about STEM through community outreach, and creating a platform to synthesize information on many topics into streamlined pathways,” he wrote in his application essay.