Western Oklahoma State College

The National Science Foundation (NSF) Rural Confluence research project aims to unite rural communities and academic partners to drive discovery and build capacity for greater climate resilience across the United States and around the world. The Rural Confluence project will advance the science and practice of rural climate resilience and create sustainable improvements in rural STEM capacity by bringing together the strengths of diverse individuals, communities, disciplines, and institutions from across the Mississippi River basin. One component of this research project is to broaden awareness of climate-related issues, such as the impacts of drought, in rural communities and to engage phenomenon-based learning as well as climate science education in K12 schools. Western Oklahoma State College (WOSC) is committed to raising awareness of the struggles within rural communities by offering scholarships to the winners of an essay contest.

For this contest, students select one of the following topics to write a 600 – 1000 word essay. The contest is open to all incoming and current WOSC students.

Essay Topics:

• Importance of rural STEM education
• Impacts of climate-related issues, such as drought, on rural communities
• Importance of agriculture education in rural communities
• Management (control) of water resources in Western Oklahoma – should laws place restrictions on personal and/or business water use?

Essays must be submitted as a PDF document to the email address listed below. Students must include their full legal name, student ID (if current WOSC student), mailing address, and email address in the upper left corner of the essay.

Essay winners will receive a $600 scholarship that will be applied to the subsequent semester’s tuition/fees bill.

Submit essays to:
Dr. Jennifer Hammack
jennifer.hammack@wosc.edu

DUE DATE: April 15