School of Engineering

Endowed Scholarships

For students excited about the potential of technology, there's no better place to learn and explore than Rensselaer's School of Engineering. The School offers a rare combination of high-quality scholarship, wide-ranging opportunities and the chance to make a difference globally.

Every year, the School of Engineering attracts some of the brightest applicants worldwide. From this gifted pool, we admit those who show promise to the Rensselaer community and the world at large: a combination of proven intellect, outstanding leadership potential, and well-rounded ability. Once these remarkable students are identified, the School makes every effort to insure that Rensselaer is a superior and affordable choice for their future.

For many students, scholarship support from the School makes a critical difference in their decision to attend Rensselaer. Sometimes scholarships encourage students from other geographic regions to apply and study in Troy. Other times, scholarships make the pursuit of a Rensselaer Engineering degree financially possible. Most importantly, scholarships provide a ringing endorsement of the School's confidence in an applicant.

Scholarship Support is Important

Scholarships help students make the most of their time in the School of Engineering. Not only do scholarships reward serious study and academic achievement, they also encourage students to take on new challenges and push past old limits. Students develop a sense of pride earned through accomplishment and often establish an early commitment to civic service.
Scholars come to Rensselaer for its outstanding academic reputation, legacy of impact, and enormous breadth of learning opportunities. By helping with their educational expenses, scholarships allow students to take advantage of these benefits without accumulating large debt burdens. Freed from financial distractions, students can focus on their education with all the energy and attention this life-shaping endeavor deserves.

At the same time, scholarships play an important role in emphasizing a sense of public duty that is integral to the field of Engineering. In conversations with Rensselaer alumni, scholarship recipients overwhelmingly cite the impact of having an early benefactor in their education and career as a reason for later wanting to multiply the benefit. Scholarships are meaningful gifts that not only make an immediate impact on the recipient's education but also establish a lasting relationship between the student and society.

Endowing a Legacy

A named scholarship can be established with a minimum gift of $250,000, payable over one to five years. This gift generates distributions of approximately five percent annually that provide expendable funds for scholarship awards.

The scholarship may be named as the donor appropriately desires, and recipients will carry that name for the duration of their award.

To establish a named scholarship, the donor and the University sign an agreement specifying the donor's intent, the gift payment schedule and acceptable criteria for selecting scholarship recipients. While unrestricted scholarships are preferred and offer the greatest flexibility to the School, a donor may specify certain preferences for award criteria.
For more information please call Richard Graw, School of Engineering Chief Advancement Officer, at 518-276-4868 or email him at grawr@rpi.edu

Endowed fellowships

Graduate students at the School of Engineering will become some of the most promising researchers and academic pacesetters of the future. Endowed fellowships help these already proven leaders achieve their goals by easing the financial pressures of graduate education. Supported by endowed fellowships, these students can take full advantage of their important training with Rensselaer Engineering faculty members and focus more fully on the demands of their coursework and research.

The School of Engineering invites individuals, corporations and foundations to invest in the next generation of engineering education and research by making major gifts to establish endowed, named fellowships. Endowed fellowships are extremely important to the School, providing support to recruit and retain high-potential graduate students through financial resources that enable them to focus on coursework and research.

Endowed fellowships provide tuition and stipends for graduate students who would otherwise be required to teach to pay tuition expenses. With the ability to focus on coursework and research, graduate students with fellowship support avoid prolonged years of study and complete graduate-school degrees without accumulating large debt burdens.

The Need

On average, it takes five years to complete a PhD, a period in which accrued expenses can complicate graduate students' academic careers and cast a long shadow over their financial status for many years to come. However, a typical fellowship of $200,000, covering tuition, health insurance and a portion of living expenses, will free these students from financial burdens and, at the same time, enable them to identify fields of endeavor that fit their particular skills and interests—a vital aspect in preparing doctoral candidates to become productive members of a society that relies increasingly on technology.

And for the School, these fellowships are one more way to attract elite individuals who, in realizing their potential, elevate the reputation of Rensselaer Engineering.

Endowing a Legacy

A gift of $400,000 or more will establish an endowed, named fellowship. A fellowship may be named as the donor desires, and recipients will carry that name through graduation.

To establish a named fellowship, the donor, and the Institute sign an agreement specifying the donor's intent, the gift payment schedule and criteria for selecting recipients.
While unrestricted fellowships are preferred and offer the greatest flexibility to the School, a donor may specify certain preferences for selected award criteria.

For more information please call Richard Graw, School of Engineering Chief Advancement Officer, at 518-276-4868 or email him at grawr@rpi.edu

School & Department Excellence Funds

The Dean designates unrestricted gifts to the highest priority needs of the School. This flexible funding allows the School to seize new opportunities that emerge, and to continue to support its existing outstanding students, faculty, programs and research.

• Create top-notch learning programs for undergraduates
• Support and reward the research endeavors of our very best students
• Facilitate cutting edge research efforts that advance both technology and engineering
• Attract and hire the most competitively recruited engineers at every stage of their careers
• Support the best and brightest graduate students in their pursuit of a Ph.D. degree
• Bring distinguished lecturers to the School, benefitting both faculty and students
• Establish and equip cutting-edge research laboratories

For more information please call Richard Graw, School of Engineering Chief Advancement Officer, at 518-276-4868 or email him at grawr@rpi.edu
grawr@rpi.edu

Endowed Professorships

Reserved for a scholar of national and international acclaim, an endowed professorship is one of the highest honors the School can bestow on a member of its faculty. These professorships play a critical role in attracting and retaining proven thought leaders who can drive Rensselaer's mission and high standard for excellence. Within academia, endowed professorships are a coveted and widely recognized accolade, signaling a colleague at the top of his or her field.

In many ways, Rensselaer's stature has become a double-edged sword. Its success has always depended on its ability to attract the best minds of each generation—both as teachers and as students. Due to its stellar reputation and ability to attract talent, Rensselaer has become a popular recruiting ground for other universities. Endowed professorships have become essential tools to express faculty members' importance to both the School and University.

Ranking among the top engineering institutions worldwide, Rensselaer Engineering is in the enviable position of having more talented individuals deserving of this recognition than it is currently able to honor. Presently, Rensselaer lags behind several of its peer institutions in the number of endowed engineering professorships it has available to award. Other institutions have placed increased pressure on the School to hold on to our most sought-after faculty members.

The School of Engineering invites individuals, corporations and foundations to invest in the next generation of engineering education, research and technology transfer by providing resources to establish named endowed professorships. These gifts contribute to the strength of the School by rewarding outstanding faculty members for their accomplishments and providing a flexible means of attracting leading talent to strengthen particular disciplines.

Endowing a Legacy

A gift of $1.5 million for a junior faculty or $3 million for a senior faculty, payable over one to five years, will name and endow a professorship. These funds will be used to underwrite the salary and benefits for the faculty.

By endowing a professorship, you are making it possible to grow one of the School's most important resources—its people. You are sponsoring a scholar of international stature and recognizing a highly distinguished record of teaching, research and publication. Moreover, you are helping the School attract new teaching and research talent while allowing it to retain the exceptional faculty already at Rensselaer.

For more information please call Richard Graw, School of Engineering Chief Advancement Officer, at 518-276-4868 or email him at grawr@rpi.edu

Named Spaces

Throughout the School and its seven Departments, there are opportunities to provide support of laboratories, classrooms and conference rooms. Your support allows the School to renovate, equip and provide aesthetic enhancements to these highly visible spaces.

For a list of the spaces available please call Richard Graw, School of Engineering Chief Advancement Officer at 518-276-4868 or email him at grawr@rpi.edu

Corporate Relations - Connecting Companies to Campus

Access to outstanding students, world-class faculty and leading-edge research are the reasons why companies of all kinds forge strategic relationships with Rensselaer. If your company needs to hire one engineer or 100, or if you need a new technical solution to enhance your competitiveness, we in Corporate Relations can help you find what you need quickly and efficiently, and pinpoint the Rensselaer resources that can be put to work for you.

The Corporate Relations Office actively seeks - and welcomes - new connections to companies large and small. One of our main goals is to find fresh perspectives and solutions to address the challenges of our long-term industry partners.

For more information please call Maria Mike-Mayer at 518-276-2116 or email Maria at mikem@rpi.edu