The NFPA Education and Technology Foundation has awarded 20 $2,000 scholarships to students pursuing fluid power related fields of study. One of the winners, Ethan Wang, is attending the University of Colorado Boulder. We asked Ethan a few questions about winning the scholarship.
What does winning a Fluid Power Scholarship mean to you?
Winning this Fluid Power Scholarship means a lot to me partially because of its profound impact upon my financial capability to pay for school. Due to unfortunate circumstances within the last couple of years regarding my father being laid off and my grandmother’s cancer diagnosis, my family has undergone a lot of hardship to save up money for college, however scholarships such as the Fluid Power Scholarship help to support my college aspirations in spite of my circumstances. Additionally, receiving this scholarship provides me motivation to continue my work as an aspiring computer scientist as it provides me with tangible results of my efforts thus far and gives me motivation to continue on.
Why did you choose to learn about fluid power?
I chose to learn about fluid power because of the various opportunities that I’ve had to work with sustainable energies in the past. In my seventh grade year, I had the opportunity to attend a summer program where I commuted to a project surrounding different methods of renewable energy and how we could find different ways to promote renewable energies to the masses. Having this contact with other renewable energies and believing that these sustainable practices are the key to the future have led me to learn more about fluid power and its applications.
What are your career aspirations? What type of fluid power job do you hope to get after you graduate?
Currently the bulk of my energy has gone into discovery as I find out different ways that I can utilize my skills in computer science to benefit society. I’ve even begun working on a project where I can utilize my expertise in VR programming to promote environmental sustainability and safety. Overall, though I don’t know exactly what I hope to do as a career, I have aspirations to utilize my unique skills to promote sustainable industries and potentially revolutionize safety within these work environments through VR and other applications.
A minimum GPA of 2.5 out of 4.0, 500-word essay, and letter of recommendation were required from each applicant. The NFPA Foundation’s goal is to help graduating high school students, and individuals enrolled in community colleges, technical schools and universities pursue their academic interests in fluid power.
One way NFPA members can get involved with scholarship programs is to volunteer as a judge to serve on the application review committee. This year 27 judges from 19 NFPA member companies reviewed 122 eligible student applications to the Fluid Power Scholarship program. If you are interested in learning more, please contact Haley Nemeth at hnemeth@nfpa.com.
