Science and Engineering Scholarships and Fellowships Blog

The National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship application is now available online.

The National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate (NDSEG) Fellowship is a highly competitive, portable fellowship that is awarded to U.S. citizens and nationals who intend to pursue graduate study in one of the 15 supported disciplines. NDSEG confers high honors upon its recipients, and allows them to attend whichever U.S. institution they choose. NDSEG Fellowships last for three years and pay for full tuition and all mandatory fees, a monthly stipend, and up to $1,000 a year in medical insurance.

The application deadline is on January 4, 2010 at 1:00pm EST. The fellowship offers will be announced on or around March 29, 2010. For Eligibility and Application Requirements, please visit the NDSEG Application Information Page.

Related Articles:
*NC State Students Receive NDSEG and SMART Fellowships
*Karen Vaughn Offered Multiple Fellowships

Three Iowa State University students received awards from the 2009 NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP). They were Cory Kleinheksel, Joseph Miller and Raathai Molian.

Cory Kleinheksel will be graduating with his BS in Computer Engineering this semester and will begin pursuing his PhD in embedded and sensor systems in the fall. Kleinheksel explains, “My proposed research is for a middleware system that emphasizes modular concepts for improved integration of sensor node data and high-level applications that would use the data.”

Joseph Miller is currently pursuing his PhD in Mechanical Engineering. His advisor, Terrence Meyer, is thrilled about Miller’s achievements throughout his academic career. Meyer exclaims, “Throughout his career and academic experiences, Joe has developed the ability to think like a researcher. He looks for the part of our understanding that is missing and develops a systematic way to address it. His excellence in academics and research deserves to be recognized with this great honor.” While pursuing his undergraduate degree, Miller was also a recipient of Science, Mathematics, and Research for Transformation (SMART) scholarship. He later on achieved the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate (NDSEG) Fellowship in 2007.

Raathai Molian graduated with her BS in Mechanical Engineering from Iowa State in 2008 and will be attending the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the fall to continue her studies in Mechanical Engineering. Molian has yet to specify a research plan, however she will continue her research in the Laboratory for Manufacturing and Productivity at MIT. Molian explained, “The award offers me flexibility and independence in my research. It provides me with a solid foundation to build upon as I earn my PhD.”

The application for the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate (NDSEG) Fellowships is now open. NDSEG is sponsored by the Department of Defense (DoD) and was created to increasing the number of U.S. citizens and nationals trained in science and engineering disciplines of military importance. To be eligible “applicants much be enrolled in their final year of undergraduate studies, or have completed no more than the equivalent of one year of academic full-time graduate study as a part-time or full-time student.” Eligible disciplines include Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, Biosciences, Chemical Engineering, Chemistry, Civil Engineering, Cognitive, Neural, and Behavioral Sciences, Computer and Computational Sciences, Electrical Engineering, Geosciences, Materials Science and Engineering, Mathematics, Mechanical Engineering, Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering, Oceanography and Physics.

The DoD pays fellow’s full tuition and required fees. Fellows also receive a stipend which increases during the second year of a fellows tenure. The first year fellows receive a 30,500 stipend award. Second and third year fellows receive 31,500.

For more on this award please review the NDSEG website.

NC State Students Receive Fellowships:

Brandon [Cochenour - in photo] is currently an Electrical Engineer with the Department of Defense, and has been employed by the Navy at the Patuxent River Naval Air Station since 2004. There, he has been involved in the research and development of next generation laser-radar systems using novel RF-photonic techniques for laser imaging and communication systems underwater. In 2006, he was awarded first place in the graduate student poster/paper competition at the IEEE Ocean Engineering Society conference for his work in underwater optical communications. He was awarded as a Top Navy Scientist and Engineer of the Year in the Emerging Investigator category, which was presented by the Assistant Secretary of the Navy for R&D in 2007.

Under the SMART fellowship, Brandon will pursue PhD studies in Electrical Engineering this Fall at North Carolina State University, where he plans to focus on optical communications and RF-photonics. He received the B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Lafayette College in Easton, PA (2003), and the M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD (2008).
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William Cox has been awarded the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate (NDSEG) Fellowship. He is currently pursuing his PhD in Electrical Engineering at NC State University under the direction of Dr. John Muth, in the area of underwater freespace optical communications. He is a founding member of the Underwater Robotics Club and writes about robotics at GoRobotics.net.

Related: Jennifer Robinson, North Carolina State NSF GRF

Engineering physics major, Karen Vaughn, offered NSF and NDSEG Fellowships

Karen Vaughn, a graduating senior from Case Western Reserve University, faces a tough decision as a new graduate. Having received two major awards to support her graduate education at the University of California at Berkeley, Vaughn will have to decide between accepting the National Science Foundation Fellowship or the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship.
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Vaughn came to the university as a transfer student from Grove City College in Pennsylvania. She says she chose Case Western Reserve for its opportunities to participate in undergraduate research projects and has spent the last two years working with physics professor Charles Rosenblatt’s research group on the study of liquid crystals.

The Rosenblatt group’s research project examined ways to control the liquid crystal orientation on a surface by controlling the “pre-tilt” angle, with the ultimate goal of achieving this on a pixel-by-pixel basis using ink-jet technology.

“If we are successful, we will be able to develop new types of switchable optical gratings for purposes of laser beam steering and optical communications,” said Rosenblatt.
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For her senior capstone project, Vaughn designed a microelectrical mechanical system (MEMS) resonator and tested the use of silicon carbide as a potential material for the resonator. She worked on the research with Mehran Mehregany, Goodrich Professor of Engineering Innovation at the Case School of Engineering and one of the pioneers of MEMS research. She plans to continue that area of research when she heads to Berkeley in the fall where she will pursue her interests in MEMS and optoelectronics.

While engineering research takes up much of her time, Vaughn has found time to continue developing her skills as a fencer and participated in the Midwestern Conference Championship. She also spends her off-campus time snow skiing in winter and water skiing in summer and thinks the two sports might translate into surfing if she has a chance to try it during her studies not far from the Pacific Ocean.

Since childhood, Vaughn said never doubted she would go into the sciences.

“I grew up in a science-minded family,” she said, adding that her father is an engineer with several patents on inventions and an uncle is a chemist.

Having fun with her father, she recalls how he conducted an experiment in the kitchen using the car battery to show the Vaughn children how to create an electromagnet and another one growing bean seeds in different soil and amounts of water to track growth.

Josh Wood, computer engineering major at Valparaiso:

Wood is one of 200 undergraduate students in the country selected to receive a 2008 National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship. More than 3,400 applications were reviewed by the research offices of the U.S. Navy, Air Force and Army from individuals pursuing graduate work in science and engineering disciplines of military importance.
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Earlier this semester, Wood became the third Valparaiso engineering student in four years to be named to the All-USA College Academic Team, selected by USA Today to recognize the nation’s most outstanding undergraduate students. USA Today named Wood to its Third Team in part because of his research in nanocomputer technology, including determining how to do matrix multiplication using quantum computing techniques.

This winter, Wood was one of only a handful of undergraduate students invited to two professional conferences – the International Semiconductor Device Research Symposium and the Applied Power Electronics Conference – to present research that could lead to improvements in the performance of microprocessors, which provide the brainpower for computers and an increasing array of consumer electronic devices such as iPods.

Related: Carnegie Mellon Engineering Students Win NDSEG Fellowships – Gustavus Alumna Receives Prestigious Fellowship – NDSEG Fellow: Heather Beem

Heather Beem, mechanical engineering major, Oklahoma State University. Beem and Larry Hoberock, professor and head of OSU’s School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, are pictured with a silverware sorting prototype she helped design and build in the school’s Robotics Laboratory. OSU engineering student receives $232,000 fellowship

She will enroll at MIT in the fall, after traveling to China this summer to see Olympic venues, Three Gorges Dam and other modern marvels as part of a study abroad short-course for OSU engineering students, and serving a summer research internship at NASA Ames Academy in California.

“Oklahoma State University is extremely proud of Heather,” said OSU President Burns Hargis. “The best representation of the ideals of OSU is our outstanding students, and Heather is a remarkable example.
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“My dad is an aquatic biologist, and when I was growing up, he’d take me tromping through the streams of Oklahoma to take measurements and look at fish,” Beem said. “I’ve had an interest in that for a while now, and the ocean is a huge frontier with lots of things to discover.”

Beem, who graduated from Norman North High School in 2003 at age 15, discovered engineering through an Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education summer academy. “I really enjoyed learning how to tackle interesting problems in my high school physics class,” Beem said. “I also liked building things, and then I participated in one of those free summer academies after my senior year.”
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During a tour of the National Taipei University of Technology, Beem, who is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and German, met and convinced researchers to hire her for an internship. “I was originally just going to visit, but they were working on a bioengineering application using the antibacterial properties of silver in wound dressings, and I thought it was really interesting,” Beem said.

“They want to use nano-silver particles and, instead of a bandage you have to replace all the time, make a dressing that releases silver at a controlled rate,” she said. “It’s cleaner and much more effective than a bandage you have to constantly rip out and replace.” The work led to the first of several technical papers on which Beem has been principal author or co-author.
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In addition to serving as structures group leader for the OSU team that won the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Student Design/Build/Fly Competition in April, Beem was a member of a student group that designed and built a prototype, inflatable wing aircraft for NASA exploration of Mars. She considers the experiences her most memorable as an OSU engineering student.

“Being involved with Dr. (Jamey) Jacob’s Mars plane team, seeing the project all the way from concept to completion, and test launching it from a weather balloon 100,000 feet in the air was really exciting. At that point, I thought, ‘I’m really going to enjoy working with technology like this,’” Beem said. “The Design/Build/Fly was also a great experience, and winning first place made us all feel great.”

Related: Oklahoma State Biosystems Engineering Student Wins NSF GRF – Arizona State Students Receive NSF Fellowship

Fellowship announcements have been sent to applicants of the NSF graduate research fellowship, NDSEG fellowship and SMART fellowship programs.

A nice overview by Mor Harchol-Balter at Carnegie Mellon University on Applying to Ph.D. Programs in Computer Science:

A Ph.D. is a long, in depth research exploration of one topic. By long we’re typically talking about 6 years. By in depth we mean that at the end of the Ph.D. you will be the world expert or close to it in your particular area.
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In contrast, a Ph.D. program typically requires typically less than 10 courses during the entire 6 years (at CMU there are 5 required “core” courses, and 3 required “electives”). The emphasis in the Ph.D. is not on classes, but rather on research.
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If you choose to be a professor at a research university, your life will consist of the following tasks: (i) doing research on anything you like, (ii) working with graduate students, (iii) teaching classes, (iv) applying for grants, (v) flying around to work with other researchers and to give talks on your research, (vi) doing service for your department and school (like giving this talk). Note that I say “your life” rather than your job, because for new faculty, your life becomes your job. It’s a fantastic job/life for me because I love these activities, so I’m happy to work hard at all of them, but it’s not right for everyone.

The document also offers a list of fellowships including: the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship and NDSEG Graduate Fellowship (both administered by ASEE). Find more science fellowship options in our Science Scholarships and Fellowships Directory.

Related: NSF Graduate Research Fellow Profiles

The NSF Graduate Research Fellowship application deadline for some applicants is November 1st. See a list of deadlines by discipline. Other deadlines for fellowships managed by ASEE:

• SMART – December 14th
• NDSEG – January 7th, 2008
• NREIP – January 14th, 2008
• SEAP (high school students) – January 28th, 2008
• Navy Postdoctoral Fellowship – no deadline

Faculty

• Navy Summer Faculty Research Program – December 4th
• Air Force Summer Faculty Fellowship – November 30th

Related: Directory of science and engineering fellowships and scholarships