LAS VEGAS — For the first time, one of the top Global Automotive Aftermarket Symposium scholarship winners took home more than just multiple scholarships. He was able to share the honor with his son.
Matthew Bisbee, a U.S. Army veteran, received four scholarship awards, while his son, Courtney Bisbee won a scholarship. They are the first father-son winners. Both are attending Lake Superior College in Duluth, Minn. Matthew Bisbee is in the collision training program, while the younger Bisbee is in the automotive service technology program.
“Every winner has a nice story,” Kornafel says. “We’ve been getting a lot of veteran applicants.”
Pete Kornafel, who runs and represents the GAAS scholarship funds, reports that there were a record number 607 scholarship applications. Of those, 248 students received 295 scholarship awards for a record $320,050. Forty students received multiple scholarships; five of them received three awards each, he reports.
While most of the recipients, 83 percent, are going to school to be technicians, there are exceptions. One is Sara Mohon, a PhD candidate in the automotive engineering program at Clemson University. She received $8,000, including $5,000 from the Women’s Board Scholarship.
“That’s a pretty good dent, even at Clemson,” Kornafel says.
Recipients include 81 percent with a high school GPA of 3.0 or better, and 49 percent of them already in a post-secondary program (90 percent of those with a GPA of 3.0 or better).
“We continue to focus on people who want to be technicians. And 83 percent of people this year are studying to be technicians, either collision or mechanical,” he states.
Applications already are being accepted for 2015; the deadline is March 31, 2015. This includes a new procedure GAAS and the University of the Aftermarket Foundation created for today’s veterans. VA benefits can cover in-state tuition, fees, books and housing. Kornafel says the organization does not want schlarships to reduce those benefits, so donors have granted GAAS permission to issue the award to the student in these instances.
Another goal for the coming year is to help more children of people in the industry. Bosch is one company promoting scholarships to its service centers.
“It really is a combination of helping people in the industry in the future and helping people who are in the industry today,” Kornafel says.
To share information on scholarships with your company or students, visit www.automotivescholarships.com.
