An internship more than a year ago, combined with hard work and undeniable good luck, led a small-town boy from rural Washington County to the unlikeliest of places: national TV attention and a scholarship to culinary school, paid for by a world-famous chef.

Scooter Telford, 20, emerged as the feel-good story in Monday night’s episode of “Hotel Hell,” a reality series on Fox in the which the shouty British chef Gordon Ramsay gives makeovers to ailing inns. The episode focused on the troubled Cambridge Hotel, which was foundering yet again, this time under the ownership of a former military man and country lawyer named John Imhof. With his family’s help, forbearance and financial bailouts, Imhof bought the historic hotel in 2007 and ran it into $750,000 worth of debt before his wife, Tina, appealed to Ramsay’s producers for help last year — without telling Imhof.

While Imhof received the brunt of Ramsay’s attention on the episode, much of it foul-mouthed and harshly critical, Telford, a prep cook on the small kitchen staff, made enough of an impression for Ramsay to promise to pay for the culinary education of the neophyte chef who someday hopes to open his own bakery. In a few weeks he starts his third semester at Schenectady County Community College, all paid for by Ramsay’s producers.

“I had no idea he was going to do that,” says Telford of the scholarship offer, delivered by Ramsay, on camera, near the end of the several-day visit by the “Hotel Hell” production crew in late January.

“My heart, like, skipped like four beats, then all of a sudden it clicked with me — all of the potential I really had, of what it meant, even so early and with so little experience in the kitchen,” he says.

“We’re definitely excited to have this young gentleman with us,” says David Brough, dean of the School of Hotel, Culinary Arts and Tourism at SCCC. Noting that a culinary instructor at the school, Melissa Doney, was a competitor on Ramsay’s “Hell’s Kitchen” series two years ago, Brough says, “This gives us another connection to Gordon Ramsay and his shows. I think (Doney) would be a good mentor” for Telford. He is also employed in the kitchen at Abeel’s Restaurant in Ballston Spa.

Telford, who graduated last year from Saratoga BOCES, was placed as a culinary intern at the Cambridge Hotel in early 2011 and that spring was hired as a prep cook. As often happens among restaurant staffs, a nickname for the new guy was soon bestowed, and it stuck: Scooter. (His full name is Donald L. Telford III.)

He recognized that the hotel was run less well than seemed ideal, he says, and his colleagues had obvious frustrations with Imhof, whom he believes the show accurately portrayed as a meddlesome micromanager unwilling to accept criticism or suggestions.

“I saw little things, but once Gordon got there, it was a big eye-opener for me for what was really wrong,” says Telford.

At first, he says, “I thought he was just going to go around yelling and screaming, but once we sat down and started talking, I saw he was a really nice guy who wanted to help.” Telford estimates he spent a couple of hours in conversation with Ramsay, though he says the chef, with 21 restaurants around the globe and 13 Michelin stars, left hands-on cooking instruction and the execution of the new Cambridge Hotel menu to the show’s culinary staff.

The scholarship is profoundly appreciated by his family, Telford says. He has already endured two surgeries apiece on his back and heart, the most recent late last year, soon before Ramsay’s arrival.

“It helps us greatly just to be able to focus on medical bills. … We didn’t have to worry about one more” for tuition, he says.

People who appear on reality TV often complain afterward about how they were made to look in the editing process, but Telford is thrilled.

“I really liked how they portrayed me,” he says. “It shows that I was just another kid in the kitchen in a small town, just working and working, and I got this great opportunity. It shows people that good things can happen at any time.”