By Bob Keating and Ken Balkey
ASME Fellows
The answer to bolstering the engineering ranks is already possible for many in the industry.
AS EMPLOYERS FRET about attracting sufficient technical talent to meet the demands of Industry 4.0 in an increasingly competitive global marketplace, and humanity cries out for solutions to pressing quality-of-life challenges, a simple, highly effective solution is within easy reach.
Scholarships.
The cost of an engineering education is incredibly high—hundreds of thousands of dollars for a bachelor’s in engineering, and 10s of thousands more for an advanced degree. Even with loans, tuition and expenses pose an insurmountable barrier to a great many high-potential young people.
This unfortunate reality robs our profession of promising talent and limits diversity of opinion and life experience across the global engineering community.
And it’s simply unfair, not only to the brilliant young people who demonstrate drive and ability and leadership but lack the financial resources to achieve their goals, but also to our wider human community that stands to benefit from the innovations that, given the chance, these capable minds may one day produce.
Scholarships address all these issues. They open doors of opportunity to those who might otherwise be left behind. They attract the best and brightest students to our profession and enable people from diverse backgrounds and with diverse perspectives to pursue an engineering education. And by virtue of that diversity, scholarships contribute to a more creative, expansive technical workforce that allows for more creative solutions to problems facing our world.
INVESTING IN THE FUTURE
For donors and awardees alike, there can be meaningful personal benefits to a scholarship. Time and again we’ve heard from scholarship recipients that the award is about more than just financial support: for many, an ASME scholarship is a vote of confidence from a highly respected organization that they are on the right track. Students are also moved to receive an ASME Scholarship in honor of a longtime ASME volunteer or staff member. Many of them state that they aspire to have the same impact with their own engineering careers as the person for whom the scholarship is named.
Ken Balkey
It’s especially gratifying knowing that family members of scholarship honorees appreciate that their loved one’s legacies are being carried forward by the next generation of engineers. As donors, that sentiment means everything—it’s perhaps the greatest benefit we receive from our scholarship fundraising efforts.
The ASME Foundation awards about a half-million dollars each year in scholarships to students at every level, from community college programs through graduate school, both domestically and internationally. Yet as proud as we are of this achievement, it’s clear we are still leaving too much promising talent behind.
We can do better. Here’s how:
The ASME Foundation accepts donations of any amount to support the general scholarship fund. There are also many named scholarship funds to which anyone can contribute, several earmarked for particular student categories (e.g., women in engineering or specialists in biomedical engineering). Donors—either individuals, corporations, or groups—are also invited to establish a named, endowed scholarship fund that will exist in perpetuity.
Bob Keating
Many donors, like the two of us, do both: we give as individuals and participate in donor groups. At ASME, this often takes the form of committees, such as those organized around Standards and Certification. Last month, the ASME Foundation attended Boiler Code Week to speak to several committees about establishing or continuing scholarships to honor past members. We’re happy to report that two committees are nearing the $50,000 threshold required to endow new ASME Foundation scholarships.
Many donors use scholarships to memorialize a late colleague or family member, creating a permanent legacy in their name. Others establish funds to advance their personal values by earmarking the scholarship to support a student pursuing, for example, sustainable innovation or transitioning from community college to a university-level engineering program. In other words, donors can exercise considerable creativity in establishing the criteria for their endowments.
At its core, engineering is all about creativity: applying rigid principles in new and unexpected ways to solve important problems. Our goal is to unleash that creativity wherever and in whomever it resides. In a world where inspired engineering can solve so many problems, and where the world’s technological, economic, and environmental security is on the line, we simply can’t afford to leave any promising talent behind.
Scholarships alone may not be enough to meet this challenge, but they are a critical piece of the puzzle—and, more importantly, they are one easy fix to expanding the pool of technical talent and leveling the playing field for the less advantaged. During this season of giving, when those of us who are privileged to call ourselves engineers consider how we can pay it forward, we urge you to consider supporting an ASME Foundation scholarship. Contact Keith Miles, ASME’s director of major gifts, to explore how you can contribute. Whether as an individual or group, donating to an existing scholarship or endowing a new one, ASME Foundation scholarships are both simple to support and far-reaching in impact.
Ken Balkey and Bob Keating are ASME Fellows, longtime ASME volunteers, and tireless advocates for ASME Foundation scholarships.