Scholarship Chairs:
Sarah Green (Entering Freshmen) and Jennifer Buechler (College)
The Society of Women Engineers Rocky Mountain Section awards scholarships each year to students entering college and students in college in CO & WY. These scholarships are meant to help students continue to excel and reach their educational goals. We want to give a special thank you to the volunteer judges who reviewed the competitive pool of applications. This year’s scholarship recipients were honored at the SWE RMS Spring Summit Award Ceremony on April 20th.
The SWE Rocky Mountain Section awards three endowed scholarships each year to students already enrolled in college and re-entry students in CO & WY. We hope that this scholarship will help collegiate students continue to excel and reach their educational goals. Let’s give a special thank you to the volunteer judges who reviewed the competitive pool of applications. This year was a difficult task to choose recipients from all our amazing applicants. This year’s recipients are truly outstanding, so we are excited to highlight a few of their achievements.
Summit Award and Scholarship Recipients at 2024 Spring Summit
Spring Summit Awards Keynote speaker Dr. Chelsea M. Magin presented Embracing a Non-linear Career Path: From First-generation College Student to Bioengineering Professor
Vicki Gate (Awards Lead), Natalie Davila-Rendon (Awards Subcommittee), and Jennifer Buechler (Scholarship Chair) presented the scholarship awards
Attendees gathered at CU Denver for the 2024 Awards Celebration
This year’s Dorolyn Lines Scholarship recipient is Jessica Tomshack. This scholarship is in memory of Dorolyn Lines who graduated with a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1923 and was one of the charter members of the Denver Section of SWE. Like Dorolyn Lines, Jessica is pursuing a degree in Mechanical Engineering; with her focus in the Aerospace track. She will be starting her 4th year this fall at Colorado School of Mines. Jessica is involved with several organizations on the Mines campus and has held progressive leadership roles in SWE, as Girl Scout Engineering Day Director last year and Vice President of Outreach this year. She gained professional experience as an intern for Northrop Grumman and as a Machine Shop Assistant. This upcoming summer, she will be interning at Ball Aerospace. Alongside these demanding volunteer and professional roles, Jessica has maintained an impressive GPA and dedication to her studies. Jessica combines a passion for engineering with a drive for leadership and outreach to inspire the next generation in STEM! Congratulations, Jessica!
Next, this year’s Lottye Miner Scholarship recipient is Nassima Bettir. This scholarship is in memory of Lottye Miner who was an early Life Member of SWE, and very active in counseling students and providing career guidance. Nassima is a graduate student at University of Wyoming pursuing a PhD in Petroleum Engineering. Previously, Nassima earned Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from University of Boumerdes in Algeria, graduating as valedictorian. Nassima is passionate about applying her engineering knowledge to innovate in the Petroleum Industry. Her research utilizes advanced data analytics to enable accurate predictions and informed decision making. In addition to her research, Nassima is President of the Society of Petroleum Engineers student chapter and works as a teaching assistant. One of her references described her as one of the best teaching assistants he has worked with in 9 years! Between her technical capability and thorough approach in all her pursuits, Nassima will undoubtedly broaden the limits of her field. Congratulations, Nassima!
The Pioneer Scholarship is in memory of three women engineering graduates of the University of Colorado and charter members of SWE: Hilda Counts Edgecomb, Elsie Eaves, and Lou Alta Melton Merrill. Graduating in 1919 and 1920, they established an early forerunner of SWE. This year’s Pioneer Scholarship recipient is Bridget Ediger. Bridget is majoring in Civil Engineering at Colorado State University with a minor in Global Environmental Sustainability. Her goal is to apply her problem-solving abilities to address climate change effect, through hydrology, hydraulics, and water resource engineering. Her supervisor from her internship with the Bureau of Reclamation put it particularly well: “She never said no to an opportunity and demonstrated the ability to effectively contribute on the business end of a shovel as well as a keyboard.” Bridget already exemplifies the humanitarian engineer through her outreach efforts in SWE, Rams Without Borders, and STEM4Kids, and her professional aims will continue to improve our world! Congratulations Bridget!
In addition to the RMS endowed scholarships, RMS also awards scholarships to graduation high school seniors. This year, we were honored to recognize 3 scholarship award recipients.
Rocky Mountain Section awards scholarships to graduating seniors from CO and WY who will soon be incoming college freshmen. Applicants are evaluated on their essay about why they are excited to become an engineer, extracurriculars and leadership experience, 2 letters of reference, and their high school transcript. This year we had many strong applicants from all over CO and WY. I want to thank our volunteer judges for evaluating these applications. I am excited to present the Incoming Freshmen Scholarship on behalf of SWE RMS. I will announce names in last name alphabetical order. When your name is announced I ask that you join me to receive your award.
Sityena Muzeyen from Overland High School in Aurora. She will be studying Computer Science at the University of Colorado Boulder. Sityena is a first generation student from her family and how technology can be a challenging gap for those who did not grow up around computers and technology. This inspired Sityena to immerse herself in learning about computer science by teaching herself HTML/CSS, excelling as a programmer on her robotic team, interning with the IT department of the Cherry Creek school system, and so much more. She is very involved in many clubs at her school including leadership roles in the Environmental Club and the Technology Student Association. She also volunteers tutoring middle schoolers and caring for cats at the Denver Dumb Friends League shelter. Congrats Sityena!
Ryan O’Connor from Battle Mountain High School in Edwards. She will be studying either Civil or Environmental Engineering at the University of Notre Dame. Ryan loves math and science and wrote about how studying things like calculus and biology, which she may not use in the future, have helped her develop deliberate problem solving skills. Living in the Rockies, she has learned that science is all around us in nature and she is passionate about protecting our natural resources, creating clean energy, and making a difference in people’s lives. Last summer, she attended the CURIE academy engineering program at Cornell University where she built a bioreactor device to keep chicks warm and attended engineering lectures. Ryan is also very involved including playing on her schools’ soccer and basketball teams and speaking at TedxVail Youth. Congrats Ryan!
Camyrn Pivarnik from Lewis-Palmer High School in Monument. She will be studying Biomedical Engineering at Duke University. Camryn was inspired at a very young age to work on assistive devices when she observed a cat’s amputation surgery and seeing the Paralympic Women’s Volleyball game also opened her eyes. She is inspired to create medical innovations that help people. Camryn has been very involved in taking medical courses both at her high school and local hospital, doing independent study on phantom limb pain, designing specialized prosthetics. She has shared these discoveries with middle schoolers and received recognition for her work at the Health Occupations Students of America State Leadership conference. She is involved in competitive volleyball and being a student leader. Congrats Camryn!
Congratulations to this year’s amazing SWE RMS scholarship recipients!!
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