Scott was born and raised in Houston, Texas. He graduated in 2013 with a B.S. in chemistry from Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana, where he studied the enzyme kinetics of β-glucosidase in the group of Professor Larry Byers and developed an intense interest in second lining and bounce music. Scott then left the warm muggy embrace of the great American South for New England, joining the department of chemistry at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. He first worked on process chemistry and organic methodology with Professor Jonathan Ellman before joining the group of Professor Jim Mayer in 2014. In the Mayer group, Scott spent more years than he thought studying the proton-coupled electron transfer (PCET) chemistry of SmI2(H2O)n. Other research foci included transition state imbalances in multiple site PCET reactions at carbon centers and attempting to observe the Marcus inverted region for PCET reactions in phenol-pyridine-anthracene triads. Scott earned his Ph.D. in 2019 and moved to the Miller group to study primary and secondary coordination sphere effects on transition metal mediated C–H bond functionalizations.
Scott spends his free time petting his loving cat Albus, making and listening to electronic music, practicing judo, working out, speaking Spanish, and trying to be a nice person.