New Scholarship to Benefit New Generations of IT Professionals

Students studying within the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO) College of Information Science and Technology will benefit from a new scholarship announced by SharePoint Saturday–Omaha through its non-profit parent, Alphabits Incorporated.

The SharePoint Saturday–Omaha Community Educational Scholarship Fund was established with a gift commitment to the University of Nebraska Foundation. The fund enables the college to award a scholarship of $1,275 annually to a qualified student to assist with his or her tuition. Qualified students must submit a scholarship application to the college, have a class standing of junior or above and have maintained at least a 3.0 GPA.

“We are absolutely thrilled to be able to offer this scholarship,” said David Petersen, leader of SharePoint Saturday–Omaha. “It has been in the works for many years now, and we are finally able to give back in a meaningful way to the University of Nebraska by providing this scholarship to students attending the University of Nebraska–Omaha, which has allowed us to use their facilities over the past six years to host our SharePoint Saturday events.”

The scholarship is the first of its kind in Nebraska for SharePoint Saturday–Omaha and Alphabits. The scholarship is fully funded for five years, and the organization has plans to fully endow the scholarship fund in the next five years and make awards available on all University of Nebraska campuses.

“We’re grateful for the generosity of SharePoint Saturday and its ability to lift financial barriers for our students,” said Hesham Ali, dean of the UNO College of Information Science and Technology. “We’re extremely fortunate to have the support of our community partners and sincerely appreciate their desire to invest in the well-being and success of our students.”

Deepak Khazanchi, associate dean and professor for the College of Information Science and Technology, added: “This new scholarship will mean all the difference for students interested in IT careers who will be entering the Nebraska workforce soon.”

SharePoint Saturday–Omaha is an annual event offering free training to users on SharePoint and Office 365.

The mission of Alphabits Incorporated is to provide free or low-cost technical training to the community. It does this through monthly meetings of the Omaha SharePoint User Group, the annual SharePoint Saturday–Omaha, and other events like full-day, deep-dive workshops on SharePoint and O365 topics. Now, it’s also able to give back to the next generation of Information Technology professionals by offering this scholarship.