Applications are open for the 2026-27 Maryland Space Grant
Scholarships, with a deadline of May 13, 2026: https://md.spacegrant.org/
These scholarships are awarded to full-time STEM majors who are
planning to work for NASA or other space-research or
aerospace-related careers.
Applicants must be U.S. citizens and enrolled full-time at UMD. Eligibility requirements also include a 3.0 GPA or better.
Space Grant puts a strong emphasis on funding students from groups that have been traditionally underrepresented in Astronomy, including women, persons of color, veterans, and LGBT+ students. It's not absolutely certain that NASA will provide funding for this scholarship this year, but the organizers are going forward with recruitment in the hopes that funding will solidify by the summer. Hopefully this will be ascertained before recipients are selected, which usually happens in July.
(Please note: if you are in an
engineering major, there is a separate Space Grant Scholarship
program specifically for engineering - contact your engineering
academic advisor to find out about this.)
Awards are typically in the $1k - 2k range and must be used for
educational expenses (tuition, books, fees, and room and board).
The award is for one year and is renewable annually; current
scholarship recipients must re-apply each year.
Please feel free to contact Dr.Melissa N. Hayes-Gehrke (mhayesge@umd.edu)
or the MD Space Grant office (collinge@jhu.edu)
if you have any questions. Good luck!
