On Thursday, April 4, 2002, at 4:02 a.m. in Oakland, California, Surya and Sreedevi became the proud parents of their eldest son, Ashwin Ganesan Suryaram. Suddenly, on December 22, 2022, Ashwin departed this life at the tender age of 20.
Ashwin was an intelligent and good-natured child who became an avid reader and developed an interest in cars very early. At the age of 3, he could associate the make and model of a car by looking at its symbol. At age 5, Ashwin read his kindergarten acceptance letter to his parents. As a middle school student, Ashwin attended advanced math courses at Collierville High School. He also volunteered to lead his school’s Designer Robotics Team and ACT study groups. A lover of classical music, Ashwin played bass for his middle school orchestra. His many passions included research, math (complex algorithms), engineering, artificial intelligence, origami, cars, cooking, teaching, music, and most recently, watching football.
In Ashwin’s 11th-grade year in high school, his father became seriously ill. He instinctively stepped in to care for his two younger brothers (Adithya and Akhilesh) while his mother cared for his father. Still, Ashwin managed to score a perfect 36 on his ACT exam and graduated with honors from Collierville High School in 2020. He enrolled in University of Alabama (UA) – Tuscaloosa, where he planned to pursue his Ph.D.
At the time of his death, Ashwin was a junior at UA Tuscaloosa, pursuing a double major in Mathematics (College of Arts and Sciences) and Computer Science (College of Engineering) while working in cooperative education at Nucor Steel Tuscaloosa. Ashwin was acknowledged as a top achieving student by Roger Sidje, Professor of Mathematics and Associate Dean for Graduate Studies:
“Ashwin was a top achieving student in the class, scoring an A+. That led me to subsequently retain him in the following Fall 2022 semester in my other MATH 499 class (Undergraduate Research). He also excelled there, to the point that he was planning to present the fruits of his research efforts at a conference early next year. It is with great sadness that I am hearing that Ashwin is going too soon at his tender age, leaving a hole in your family and our scientific community.”
Ashwin will always be remembered for his beautiful spirit and a generous heart.
In addition to his parents (Surya and Sreedevi) and two brothers (Adithya and Akhilesh), Ashwin leaves to mourn Uncle and Aunt (Rajaji and Pavithra, of Los Angeles, California), Uncle and Aunt (Sridhar and Archana of Bengaluru, India), paternal grand-parents (Ganesan and Lakshmi of Chennai, India), maternal grand-parents (Shanmugam and Meena of Nellore, India), host of cousins, girlfriend (Brianna Morelli), host of family-friends, classmates and colleagues from Collierville High School, The University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa and Nucor Steel Tuscaloosa.
A visitation for Ashwin will be held Saturday, January 7, 2023 from 12:00 PM to 3:00 PM at Collierville Funeral Home, 534 West Poplar, Collierville, TN 38017.
Fond memories and expressions of sympathy may be shared at www.colliervillefuneral.com for the Suryaram family.
