Mac Scholarships Forum: “Celebrating More Than a Decade of Mac Scholarship Awards at the AIChE Centennial”

Since 1994 (more than a decade ago) the Minority Affairs Committee (MAC) of AIChE has developed and sustained a scholarship program for high school (incoming freshman) and college students seeking the chemical engineering baccalaureate degree. A total of about 240 scholarships have been awarded to African-American, Hispanic and Native American students who have excellent academic records and are also in financial needs. Members of the panel include current and past MAC scholarship recipients who have been very successful in their career and will share their stories. The panel will also feature sponsors, including members of AIChE who through their contributions via the AIChE annual dues check-off have made a lot of difference to sustain the scholarship program. FMC, the major corporate sponsor of the MAC Scholarship Awards, will be recognized for its continuous support of the scholarship program. The MAC scholarship Forum will conclude with a presentation addressing what attracts minority students to chemical engineering, what fraction of them leave compared to overall retention, why those students leave, and what can be done to aid recruitment and retention of underrepresented minorities in chemical engineering.