Posted: Tuesday, June 2, 2009 12:00 am
Frank Liu, 15, plans to study engineering, computer science
By Alex Paul
Gazette-Times reporter
Like many high school sophomores, 15-year-old Crescent Valley High School student Frank Liu has a busy summer ahead of him.
He's going on a family vacation to Europe, where he hopes to celebrate his 16th birthday at the top of the Eiffel Tower. Getting a driver's license is a personal goal, and he's going to work on a computer science research project.
But unlike his peers, Liu won't be coming back to Crescent Valley in the fall. He has been accepted at Stanford University in Palo Also, Calif., where he will study electrical engineering and computer science.
The transition begins Monday evening when Liu - who has a 4.0 grade point average - will graduate with the Class of 2009 as one of 10 valedictorians.
"I like to think of myself as half sophomore, half senior," Liu said with a laugh.
Liu said he became interested in computers as a child and began exploring electrical engineering during middle school. His family moved to Corvallis from New Jersey when Liu was 7 years old. He attended Hoover Elementary and Cheldelin Middle School.
His academic program skyrocketed as a freshman, when he began taking classes at Oregon State University.
"I found that I really enjoyed it," Liu said. "People were very friendly, and it was a real fit for me."
Liu was a member of CV's technology team, took first place in the high school table tennis tournament and the OSU intramural table tennis tournament. He was on the first place team at the Oregon Invitational Mathematics Tournament.
At OSU, Liu is working on a computer science project, tracking information about football that he hopes will allow coaches to more closely analyze individual player performances.
How did he graduate so early?
"OSU is on a quarter system, and Crescent Valley is on the semester system," Liu said. "Through OSU, I was able to take more classes and they also carried more credit weight. It all just added up quickly."
In addition to Stanford, Liu also was accepted at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Liu is the son of Huaping and Catherine Liu. His father is an associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science at OSU. His mother is a homemaker. He has two younger brothers, Ethan, 9, and Raymond, 7.
Liu plans to pursue a doctoral degree and become a university professor and researcher.
He admires a quotation from Henry Adams, great grandson of the nation's founding father, John Adams, "They know enough who know to learn."
Alex Paul can be contacted at alex.paul@lee.net or by calling 758-9526.