Microsoft Scholarships
"Gates" and "Redmond" Synonymous with Computing
Microsoft Corporation has a long and storied history, as colorful as the Apple story. In fact the celebrated rivalry between Apple’s Steve Jobs and Microsoft’s Bill Gates has been ongoing since the mid-1970s and has been popularized and dramatized in both print and on the screen.
Microsoft’s Suit and Tie Persona Aligns Well with Business
When both early computing geeks emerged from their garage workshops they gave the world personal computing machines that closely resembled each other on the outside, but bore little resemblance to one another in language, operating system (OS), and even philosophy. In fact their yin/yang, black/white, light/dark personas permanently and effectively polarized the entire PC world. Microsoft fans stuck with every permutation the MS OS experienced, while Apple devotees religiously defended their then counter-intuitive Macintosh machines.
Microsoft has clearly won big support from the business world, whose rapid globalization has sought out the equally rapid succession of MS evolutions. Microsoft has turned out software built for business both large and small and continues to maintain its mainstream, bourgeois roots, in contrast to the independent, art and youth-centric Apple image.
Microsoft Scholarships Support Next Gen Computer Engineers
The Microsoft scholarship program of course underscores the need to provide support and guidance to the next generation of computer engineers, programmers and software developers. Scholarships assist students throughout North America. Scholarships target all kinds of undergraduate students with the overriding requirement that they be engaged in a four-year degree program in computer science or programming, or else a very closely related field.
Microsoft scholarships are awarded on the basis of a range of criteria, including a preference for women, minorities and students with disabilities. But there are those as for "general" applicants, as well, or those who fall outside the heading of female and/or minority. All are ultra-competitive. Recipients are given a monetary award equal to a full year of their tuition. Books, computers and other expenses are excluded and recipients must participate in a paid summer internship with Microsoft. Applicants with a demonstrated financial need are given preference.
High Level Research Scholarships
European student-scholars compete for the annual Microsoft Research European Ph.D. Scholarships. The program is available to students on the cusp of their doctoral program or in the throes of, at eligible European universities. Awards are a yearly 33,000 Euros, or about $42,500 depending on currency valuations. Applicable research must be highly innovative and "at the intersection of computing and the sciences."