UA Offering Mentorships to Engineering Students
by February 4, 2013 12:00 am 65 views
A new program at the University of Arkansas aims at encouraging more engineering students to continue on to graduate school.
Scholarships for eligible undergraduates and mentorships with faculty and industry professionals form the heart of the program called Student Integrated Intern Research Experience, or SIIRE.
UA engineering professor Manuel Rossetti leads the program, which is funded with a National Science Foundation grant that will pay out $600,000 over five years. Rossetti, who holds the John L. Imhoff Endowed Chair in Industrial Engineering, wrote in an email that the program is actively recruiting students and local businesses.
“When we submitted the [grant] proposal, we had 16 Arkansas-based companies write letters of support indicating strong interest in the program, Rossetti wrote.
Students in the program will earn class credit through a paid job or internship in an engineering field. A research project related to their work will become their master’s thesis and help both students and mentors understand how engineering research can be applied on the job.
The program is open to all engineering disciplines, a news release stated, and participants will be able to earn both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in 5 ½ years.
“We hope to create a pipeline of diverse engineering professionals having graduate degrees [who will] contribute to the research and teaching infrastructure in the state of Arkansas and create a model program for the nation,” Rossetti said in the release.
The first scholarships will be awarded by the end of the spring semester, he wrote in the email. He anticipates about 16 scholarships will be awarded the first year, and about 30 students will be eligible this year.