Travis Schedler, a senior at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, is well on the way toward paying for his first year in college with a $15,000 scholarship as the fifth-place winner of the nationwide 57th annual Westinghouse Science Talent Search Competition.
Schedler, who lives in Carbondale, submitted a mathematics research project, “Construction and Properties of Set-theoretical Solutions to the Quantum Yang-Baxter Equation.” It is about quantum group theory, a subject linking mathematics and physics. He completed the project last summer during a six-week program at the Research Science Institute of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The Westinghouse competition, the most prestigious academic contest in the United States for high school students, requires a written report on research in science, mathematics or engineering.