When Trung Quach came to Georgia Perimeter College from Vietnam three years ago, he was so shy he barely said a word in class.

“I didn’t speak English very well, and after class I would just silently leave the classroom,” Quach remembers. That changed, he says, thanks to encouragement from his chemistry and biology professors—and his job at the Clarkston Learning and Tutoring Center,

Quach is one of two GPC recipients of the 2014 Jack Kent Cooke Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship.

With a 4.0 GPA in biological sciences, Quach already has been accepted to Georgia Tech, where he hopes to study biochemistry with an eye toward continuing on to medical school.  

As an international student, he will have to pay out-of-state tuition at Tech. The JKC scholarship, which will pay the cost of completing his bachelor's degree at an amount of up to $30,000 a year for up to three years, will help him tremendously, he says.

“My mom and dad were so happy and proud of me. They said I made the whole family proud,” he says.

The news of Quach’s scholarship also thrilled those working in the Clarkston LTC, where he is a favorite of students seeking help with their math and science questions. “Trung is one of those people who work well with students, and they seek him out,” says Mary Hamilton, Clarkston LTC interim director. 

Quach says it was his tutoring experiences that inspired him. “I never thought I was good at math, but working in the tutoring center gave me a chance to practice more. When a student asked me a question I didn’t know, I went to find it out.”

Quach, 21, is now co-president of the Clarkston Campus Math Club, which he helped lead to regional honors during two recent math competitions. He also has been accepted as a summer undergraduate researcher at Emory University.  

Research is his passion, and he hopes to one day find a cure for hyperthyroidism, a condition that has impacted his mother's health. 

“My dream is to study medicine and find curative drugs,” he says. “I want to find a cure for hyperthyroidism and thyroid cancer, if not in time for my own mother, then at least in time to save others.”