  {"id":8887,"date":"2012-08-10T13:05:10","date_gmt":"2012-08-10T23:05:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=8887"},"modified":"2021-03-17T13:15:07","modified_gmt":"2021-03-17T23:15:07","slug":"stem-scholarships-benefit-leeward-students","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2012\/08\/10\/stem-scholarships-benefit-leeward-students\/","title":{"rendered":"STEM scholarships benefit Leeward students"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><figure id=\"attachment_8972\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8972\" style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/lcc-scholarship.jpg\" alt=\"A group holding a donation check\" width=\"400\" height=\"256\" class=\"size-full wp-image-8972\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/lcc-scholarship.jpg 400w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/lcc-scholarship-260x166.jpg 260w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-8972\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">North Star Scientific&#8217;s Sharmaine Swisher, Robert Swisher, Jim Stamm and Leeward Community College Chancellor Manny Cabral celebrate their partnership in support of student scholarships.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Students at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.leeward.hawaii.edu\">Leeward Community College<\/a> pursuing studies or a teaching degree in the science, technology, engineering or math fields now have an even greater opportunity to obtain scholarships towards their education thanks to a $75,000 pledge from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nsshawaii.com\/\">North Star Scientific<\/a> to support scholarships for full-time and part-time students.<\/p>\n<p>This new gift from the Kapolei-based company builds on its $30,000 gift in 2009 that established the North Star Scientific Scholarship.<\/p>\n<p>To date, this scholarship has benefited 26 students, many of whom were graduates of Leeward-area high schools including <span aria-label=\"Aiea\">&#699;Aiea<\/span> High School, Campbell High School, Kamehameha Schools, McKinley High School, Mililani High School, Moanalua High School, Pearl City High School, <span aria-label=\"Waianae\">Wai&#699;anae<\/span> High School and Waipahu High School.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I see so many students struggling to pay their tuition,&rdquo; said <strong>Aileen Lum-Akana<\/strong>, who has served as Leeward&#8217;s financial aid director for the past 10 years. &ldquo;We are sincerely thankful to North Star Scientific for reaching out and providing our STEM students with much needed financial support.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>North Star Scientific was started by James Stamm and University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Âé¶¹´«Ã½<\/span> alumni Robert and Sharmaine Swisher in 2001. It designs, develops, tests and flight qualifies high performance electronics for land-based, ship-based and airborne Department of Defense applications.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;We at North Star Scientific are honored to have the opportunity to share our blessings and support individuals in our community who are furthering their career paths through education,&rdquo; said Stamm, president and CEO. &ldquo;At the same time, we are seeding the future local workforce with the technical skills we will need to grow our staff and the high tech industry in general.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Robert Swisher graduated with his associate degree from Leeward in 1993 and went on to obtain a bachelor&#8217;s degree in physics in 1997 and a master&#8217;s degree in engineering in 1999, both from the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.manoa.hawaii.edu\">University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Âé¶¹´«Ã½<\/span> at M&#257;noa<\/a>. Sharmaine Swisher graduated with a bachelor&#8217;s degree in mathematics from <abbr>UH<\/abbr> M&#257;noa in 2001.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Sharmaine and Robert Swisher are wonderful examples of alumni who truly believe in giving back,&rdquo; said Leeward Community College Chancellor <sttrong>Manny Cabral.<\/sttrong><\/p>\n<p>Read the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.midweek.com\/area-firm-funds-lcc-scholarships\/\"><em>Midweek West <span aria-label=\"Oahu\">O&#699;ahu<\/span><\/em> cover story<\/a> to learn more about the donation.<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8212; Adapted from a University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Âé¶¹´«Ã½<\/span> Foundation <a href=\"http:\/\/www.uhfoundation.org\/news\/press_releases\/2012\/press_release-120706.aspx\">news release<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kapolei-based North Star Scientific continues its support of Leeward Community College as it puts new funding towards student scholarships.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,24],"tags":[65],"class_list":["post-8887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academic-news","category-uh-in-the-news","tag-leeward-community-college","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8887"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8887\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":137346,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8887\/revisions\/137346"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}