The scholarship program is funded through royalties received from patents held by employees in the NIS Division, which has a long history of developing instruments for space missions and interpreting data from those instruments to increase our understanding of the solar system and galaxy.
"This is probably the most personally rewarding thing I've done here since coming to the Laboratory about nine years ago," said Terry Hawkins, deputy director of the NIS Division. Hawkins came up with the idea for the program as a way to enhance the future workforce of the division.
The NIS Student Education Scholarships Program was established with help from specialists in the Laboratory's human resources, business and legal offices, who determined the ins and outs of converting the $23,000 NIS Division received through royalties into scholarship money.
Frank Gonzales, of the Laboratory's Human Resources Division, said because of the NIS scholarship program's uniqueness and benefit to students, he already has contacted other divisions about it.
"It's my hope that the other divisions will take advantage of the groundwork that NIS has laid and develop similar scholarship programs for their students," Gonzales said.
Nominations for the NIS scholarships were made by NIS group managers from the students who worked in the division last summer. NIS Division employs about 100 high school, undergraduate and graduate students during the summer.
Two of the scholarships went to Los Alamos employees who are independently involved in educational programs that will qualify them for technical positions at the Laboratory.
Annual patent royalties go to the researchers who licensed the patent and a share goes to the divisions or program offices where the researchers reside. In previous years, NIS Division used its royalty share to fund small projects.
Los Alamos National Laboratory, a multidisciplinary research institution engaged in strategic science on behalf of national security, is operated by Los Alamos National Security, LLC, a team composed of Bechtel National, the University of California, The Babcock & Wilcox Company, and Washington Group International for the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.
Los Alamos enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction, and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health, and global security concerns.