Nine students seeking careers in manufacturing earned $1,500 toward their education from Nuts, Bolts & Thingamajigs, a Fabricators & Manufacturers Association-sponsored foundation.

This year, the group awarded scholarships totaling $13,500 to college- or trade school-bound postsecondary students who seek careers in manufacturing. The 2010 winners are John Bennett of New Franklin, Mo.; Thomas Brown of Evansville, Ind.; Guy Chan of Vancouver, Wash.; Christopher Ditalia of Deer Park, N.Y.; Joe Dobie of Yakima, Wash.; Earley Cody Hill of Albany, Ohio; Ryan Melville of Naches, Wash.; Christopher Norman of Willingboro, N.J.; and Lance Poeppelman of West Mansfield, Ohio.

“We congratulate the students selected as NBT scholarship award winners, and are pleased to assist them in fulfilling their academic goals,” said Gerald Shankel, president and CEO of Nuts, Bolts & Thingamajigs. “These students recognize that working a skilled manufacturing job can be rewarding financially and fulfilling personally. Our 2010-11 winners show that education is not an activity reserved for people in their teens and early 20s. Half of this year’s winners are over 40 and are going back to school full-time to acquire skills that will help them be more competitive in the 21st century manufacturing job market.”

All of the 2010 scholarship winners will attend a technical college or community college.

To be eligible for the scholarships, applicants were required to be full-time students meeting a specified minimum grade-point average and enrolled in an engineering or manufacturing-related course of study, or a trade or technical program leading to a career in manufacturing. Students were responsible for submitting academic records and an engineering or manufacturing-related program description with each application.

In addition to the monetary grant, each scholarship winner also received from NBT’s industry partner SolidWorks Corp., a copy of its student design CAD software package. The kit is a Windows-based 3-D CAD application.