Fish & Richardson announced that full scholarships have been awarded to three Wilmington middle school students, Destiny Hayward-McDaniel, Jason Stewart, and David Miller, to attend the U.S. Space & Rocket Center Space Camp in Huntsville, Alabama this summer.
The goal of Fish’s Space Camp Scholarship program – which the firm has run for 18 consecutive years – is to get middle school students excited about the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Fish launched the Space Camp Scholarship program in 1999 and has since sent over 450 students to Space Camp on full scholarships.
Fish attorneys select the scholarship winners based on a written application and an in-person interview. Each year, Fish sends 33 students – from economically disadvantaged areas in the 11 cities across the country where the firm has offices – along with teacher chaperones to Space Camp.
In Wilmington, the students were selected from Stanton Middle School.
The scholarship winners – who receive full tuition, round-trip airfare, and accommodations – will spend six days at Space Camp experiencing simulated space shuttle missions, participating in programs on space exploration, and learning about mission control.
“It is a privilege to meet these impressive students each year, and to have the opportunity to foster their interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM),” said Susan Morrison Coletti, managing principal of Fish’s Delaware office. “STEM education will enable the next generation of innovators to develop new technology, which will help drive our economy. We need to do everything we can to engage and excite young people, like these students, and foster their interest in STEM.”
After the students return from Space Camp, many of them meet with the attorneys from Fish to “report on their mission” and talk about their experiences as junior astronauts for a week. For the attorneys, it is another opportunity to encourage the students to keep on exploring STEM and to excel in their studies when they return to school in the fall.
