WKU News

Gatton Academy of Mathematics and Science in Kentucky senior Allen Lin (’22, Larry A. Ryle HS) has received the competitive Gates Scholarship, a program funding only 300 students per year for the full cost of attendance not already covered by other financial aid.

The Gates Scholarship launched in 2017, and through it, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation continues its long-standing commitment helping outstanding minority students from low-income backgrounds realize their maximum potential.

This prestigious scholarship program is based on evidence that by eliminating the financial barriers to college, a last-dollar scholarship can enable high-potential, low-income minority students excel in coursework, graduate college, and continue to be leaders throughout their lives.

Lin states, “It is such an honor to be recognized as a Gates scholar. I am so grateful to everyone who supported me. I aspire to become a professional mathematician who helps make math enthralling and fun to learn for others, thereby changing the stigma about math. I know that I will be in an excellent math program at MIT. The scholarship will provide me with the resource to pursue what I love and to be successful.”

As a tutor at Gatton, Lin says, “I became a peer tutor during my first semester at Gatton because I wanted to make math fun and easier to learn for my classmates. I tutor individually and lead weekly review sessions in Calculus I and Calculus II because most Gatton students are enrolled in those classes. Moreover, I also tutor classmates on more advanced topics, like discrete mathematics, linear algebra, and differential equations.”

He is currently the co-president of Chess Club and is a member of Math Club. He has conducted number theory research with Dr. Dominic Lanphier of the WKU Mathematics Department since his first semester and also attended the Research Science Institute (RSI) during summer 2021. There, he worked with MIT faculty on an original math research project about circular symmetrization.