$25,000 Scholarship Goes To San Ramon Senior

SAN RAMON, CA — Dougherty Valley High School senior Ruchir Baronia is one of 11 students to win a $25,000 Taco Bell Foundation Live Más Scholarship as he eyes his freshman year at the University of California, Berkeley.

Ruchir won the grand prize, Taco Bell said. About 11,000 students applied for the scholarship.

Ruchir was chosen for his work creating emergency app Rescuer, which taps into voice recognition software and allows users to call for help without touching their phone. The request for help is triggered by a key phrase set by the user.

"My app Rescuer was inspired after my grandfather, who had severe Alzheimer's, slipped on his bathroom floor, his phone just out of reach to call for help," Ruchir said in his application video, filmed from a Taco Bell booth.

In his application video, Ruchir said he gave a TedX talk on how he taught his computer to rap, helped create a bot and founded a hack-a-thon.

Ruchir said he plans to study computer science and business at UC Berkeley, and create an artificial intelligence startup that aims to predict neurodegenerative diseases with brain scan data — to help people like his grandfather.

Watch his application video here.