Rodney D Hatfield Scholarship Endowment
With the help of generous donations and a very successful inaugural golf tournament, we were able to endow the Rodney D Hatfield Scholarship in 2020. The first scholarship was awarded to Andrew Evans, a TTU Mechanical Engineering student from Greenville, TX, in the fall of 2020. Below is the Thank You letter that Andrew wrote to the Hatfield family sharing what the scholarship meant to him.
Dear Hatfield Family,
I am greatly honored to be chosen to receive the Rodney D. Hatfield Legacy Scholarship. I hail from just east of Dallas, Texas, from a small town called Greenville. When it came to my choice of colleges, my options were: UT Tyler, UT Austin, Texas A&M, and Texas Tech; however, to be honest, the only reason I put down schools other than TTU was because Apply Texas recommends putting down more than one college. TTU is the college I really wanted to attend because my dad and his brothers came here. My dad received his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from TTU and then continued to receive his M.S. in Mechanical Engineering. I chose to look deeper into Mechanical Engineering my sophomore year of high school. It feels like I made the decision to pursue this degree in a different way than a lot of others do. I looked at the several subjects and concepts that I enjoyed and were fascinated by in high school, and then looked at what all Mechanical Engineering entailed. It just so happened that almost everything I saw in the courses required for this degree were classes I knew that I would enjoy and benefit from. Therefore, after further deliberation, I decided on this course of study.
I have just recently been transferred out of foundational engineering and into my desired major of Mechanical Engineering. Currently, I am involved in the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), and I hope to eventually be a part of the National Honors Society of Mechanical Engineers (Pi Tao Sigma). I have finally fulfilled all the requirements to be invited and hopefully inducted into this organization, and I am incredibly excited about it.
Soon to come, I would really enjoy becoming a tutor for some Mechanical Engineering courses and eventually become a Supplemental Instructional Leader (S.I.)/T.A. for Mechanics of Materials (Solids) and/or Statics. Other than that, I would like to apply for the 150-hour program, a program that allows one to take master’s classes instead of engineering electives. On top of that, I would also like to study under someone working at TTU who does research in stress and strain analysis and possibly get an internship, paid or unpaid, with them.
The best way I can describe how this scholarship will help me is that it will remind me that hard work indeed pays off, and it will give me an even greater incentive to not only continue doing what I have been doing in terms of my studies, but to do even better. This scholarship will light a fire under me to do my best and be successful.
I wish to thank you for your generosity and faith in me as a student and as a person. I really appreciate what you have done for me and can promise you today that this award you have graciously given me will not be wasted.
Sincerely,
Andrew Evans
The ability for the Hatfield family to award these scholarships in Rodney's honor would not be possible without the continued support of the golf tournament. We are grateful for each of you and are looking forward to another great event in October!
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"The Edward E. Whitacre, Jr. College of Engineering is a globally elite college of engineering composed of a community of scholars; faculty, students and staff all working together to educate the best engineering talent in the world. All our graduates are internationally aware, have solid engineering fundamentals, an understanding of how their profession affects human society and are prepared to be technological leaders, regionally, nationally and internationally. Red Raider Engineers are simply the best of the best."