Dedicated to building a pipeline of talent that will support a stronger economic foundation in Michigan, the Leinweber Foundation has made a gift to create a new STEM scholarship program at Michigan State University, with a special emphasis on retaining bright students with roots in the state.
The Leinweber STEM Scholars scholarship fund at MSU aims to support students from rural Michigan counties who are pursuing degrees in STEM fields – science, technology, engineering and mathematics – with an expressed interest in seeking a STEM career in Michigan after graduation.
The Leinweber Foundation is a Michigan-based family foundation, established in 2015 by software entrepreneur Larry Leinweber and his wife Claudia Babiarz. The foundation invests in innovative research, access to education and community initiatives that can build a better world.
Hailing from a one-room schoolhouse and the youngest of four children in a single-parent household, Larry Leinweber set high achievement goals for himself. He graduated from MSU in 1964 with a physical sciences degree and an eye on a career in the then emerging field of software and systems engineering. By 1981, he had founded New World Systems, providing enterprise resource planning software for city and county governments.
“The Leinweber Foundation is excited to support students whose backgrounds and interests closely connect with my father’s,” said Ashley Leinweber, Vice President of the Leinweber Foundation. “We hope the Leinweber STEM Scholars will find the freedom to more fully explore opportunities and resources available to STEM students at MSU, while also thinking how they can apply their degree to make a difference in Michigan communities.”
The Leinweber STEM Scholars program will award $30,000 scholarships to students who are residents of and graduated from a high school in a Michigan county with a population of less than 200,000 people and who are majoring in STEM. Eligible STEM majors include Physics, Biology, Chemistry, Biochemistry, Mathematics, Statistics, Astrophysics, Computer Science in Lyman Briggs College or a teaching degree in any of these majors. Preference will be given to students from Osceola County where Larry grew up.
Beginning in 2025, scholarships will be awarded to four second-year students each fall, and the eligible recipients will receive $10,000 per year for three years for their sophomore, junior and senior years. The program intends to build a cohort of 12 Leinweber STEM Scholars at MSU.
Applications for the first round of recipients are being accepted through April 1, 2025.
“Larry Leinweber is a visionary innovator and leader in our state,” said MSU President Kevin M. Guskiewicz, Ph.D. “He’s an accomplished and proud Spartan alum, and we are grateful for this exciting new initiative that will remove obstacles for rural students to pursue degrees and careers that will define the future in Michigan and beyond.”
Additionally in 2021, the Leinweber Foundation committed $2.5 million to MSU to endow the Leinweber Software Scholars Fund. The fund provides scholarship support for computer science and engineering students from underserved areas in Michigan, especially more rural counties.
For more information on the Leinweber Foundation, visit www.LeinweberFoundation.org
To learn more about support for students, contact Senior Director of Development for Student Success Madison Dugan at duganmm@msu.edu or by calling (248) 229-5845.
This story was originally posted to givingto.msu.edu.
