Sustainability Scholarship

Ecolab has donated close to $2 million in scholarship funding for undergraduate students to be distributed in the following ways: 1) $750,000 in funding to Carlson students, and 2) 1.1 million in funding to all other undergraduate programs. Carlson will coordinate the scholarship selection process within our own college and Amy Hackett (cc’d) in the Office of Undergraduate Education (OUE) will coordinate the scholarship selection process for all other colleges. This will be a multi-year scholarship program in which current students receive up to $7,500 per academic year. As Ecolab Scholars, students will additionally be expected to participate in engagement activities related to sustainability. Together, Ecolab and the University of Minnesota hope to prepare future leaders who will put sustainability into practice.
 

The Carlson and OUE scholarship committees need experts in sustainability to serve as application reviewers and provide feedback on candidates. As faculty members with a significant interest in promoting sustainability on our campus, will you consider being a scholarship selection committee member for this program? Here are further specifics to note:

Timeline: The scholarship application will be available to students from March 5th to April 15th. Applications for your review will likely be available in mid to late May and our hope is to announce all scholarship decisions by mid June. 

Application Review: In order to be considered for the Ecolab Scholars Program, students are asked to respond to the following prompts:

How did you discover your interest in sustainability and the environment? What about sustainability and the environment sparks your passion or moves you to action, and why? (300 words max.)

How will participating in engagement activities focusing on sustainability and the environment contribute to your educational goals? (300 words max.)

An ideal candidate for this program will have a demonstrated commitment to sustainability and the environment with a preference for students who have at least two-three years remaining at the University. Additionally, students must maintain adequate degree progress and meet financial need guidelines as determined by the University of Minnesota and the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). 

Rubric: We have created a standard rubric that will be used to assess each candidate in both the Carlson and OUE applicant pools. The main criteria that will be assessed is how well a student demonstrates a commitment to sustainability and the environment and their overall engagement with these topics.

Process: All eligible candidates will first be reviewed separately by the scholarship committees in Carlson and the OUE. For your role, you will be serving as a selection committee reviewer during the second stage of the review process, meaning you will not be reviewing every single application but rather the ‘top tier’ of the candidate pools (roughly 30 applicants). Each application will likely take between 5-10 minutes to review.

stephs