Cooper Lay tried to find the “perfect opportunity” at an out-of-state school. Nothing ever felt right which made Purdue University look even better.

The Shelbyville High School Class of 2023 Salutatorian will study Computer Science at Purdue beginning this fall.

“Purdue wasn’t my first choice because I didn’t really want to be somewhere in Indiana,” said Lay. “My family took a road trip to Massachusetts and we saw places like Harvard and MIT and Yale. And I went to California in the summer to take classes at Stanford. All those campuses are amazing but I never really found a place that connected with me.

“I would like to say I went to Purdue’s campus and it was perfect. It wasn’t like that, but Purdue’s campus did really resonate with me. I really liked it.”

Lay, the son of Bill and Corrina Lay, leaned on advice he got from a teacher with regard to his college choice.

“One of my teachers said they saw college as if you could live anywhere for four years or eight years of your life, where you could have some of the responsibilities of life, but not all of them, where would you want to be?” Lay stated.

What Lay realized about Purdue was it presented the right academic environment for him.

“They way I think about college, the campus is very important and the academics, but the people are very important for me too,” he said. “I think about these big colleges, like Ivy League where the students are very inspiring to me, if I was working there I think I would work harder to be on everyone’s level.

“I think Purdue has that too. I think Purdue, being an engineering school, even though I am not going into engineering, is a place where they really like innovation and hard work to get what you want, even something small.”

Lay envisions himself as a long-term student, even casually mentioning being a professor would be “cool.”

“I really like math but there is not a lot of money in that so Computer Science is like the happy medium, very creative and I like that, but it also involves a lot of math,” he said. “Software engineering or website development is something I see as where I can do what I love but it also can let me sustain a life.”

With a birth date one day after the Shelbyville school system’s registration deadline, Lay always felt advanced in the early stages of his educational track.

“In preschool, I don’t think I was a standout student. My birthday is the day after registration for preschool so I had to wait another year,” he said. “So when I got into preschool, I got more attention because I was more developed.

“When they really started treating me differently was in kindergarten. They pulled me out for math classes. They put me in first grade math in kindergarten. I don’t know if it was deserved but that’s what they did.”

With graduation complete, Lay is enjoying his free time to read more and prepare himself for college life.

“I think it is really exciting,” he said. “When I went to Stanford, a big problem with it was I felt like I was on vacation. I went there and the campus was so extravagant, not like anything I’ve seen before. I felt like I couldn’t be at home.

“Because I’ve had that experience, going to Purdue … I hope I can find somewhere that feels like home. Becoming a freshman again is very exciting for me. I can have the change again to find somewhere that I really enjoy and feel comfortable.”

This is the ninth in a series of feature stories from the Shelby County Post on Shelby County’s Class of 2023 valedictorians and salutatorians.

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