Rocky Point High School senior Om Patel was honored with the Andrew McMorris Foundation Scholarship.

As the criteria for the award includes a student’s qualities of kindness, care, selflessness and a concern for others including a commitment to the community, their education and a strong desire to experience an impactful life, Om fit the bill for the honor. 

Mrs. Alisa McMorris shared that they chose Om because of his dedication to science research, sharing that her daughter Arianna said, “Om is going to cure cancer!” Om is an exceptional student who was involved on a research project at Brookhaven National Laboratory where they used deep learning and AI to improve how the sPHENIX detector at BNL processes data from high-energy particle collisions. He and his research partner RPHS Class of 2025 salutatorian Zen Pinkenburg, also received an Honorable Mention at the Long Island Science & Engineering Fair.

The Andrew McMorris Foundation scholarship was named in honor of Andrew McMorris, who consistently demonstrated his compassion and care for others. His passion and zest for life was unrelenting and he never wanted to waste a moment. He loved music, scouting, painting, skiing, hiking, dancing and traveling, but most of all he loved aviation. Ever since he could walk, Andrew dreamed that one day he would become a pilot and had already taken his first flight lesson by the summer of 2018. Andrew was a dreamer who lived his life to the fullest.