The EE/EEE alumni of BUET have undertaken an initiative to launch the scholarship project titled ‘EEE Alumni Excellence Award’ and ‘Prof. Mohammad Ali Choudhury Memorial Award’, dedicated to the memory of late Professor Mohammad Ali Choudhury, who envisioned collaboration between EE/EEE alumni of BUET living around the globe and the Department of EEE, BUET. Prof. Mohammad Ali Choudhury sir was a legendary figure, a great mentor as well as a wonderful human being. In his long career of more than 30 years at BUET, he served as the Head and Dean of the EEE department and was known for great teaching, and dedication to continuous enhancement of academic and research environment. His countless instances of helping attitude towards different backgrounds of people sound like stories and myths. A truly inspirational figure who died in 2018 bearing cancer. Before the untimely demise, Prof. Mohammad Ali Choudhury sir envisioned a scholarship project for the undergraduate students which would solely be determined based on academic performance. The initial guidelines and working policies of the proposal were outlined by him. As Prof. Mohammad Ali Choudhury sir became very sick in late 2017 and early 2018, the project could not get started but a team of EEE alumni members kept following up with the Department of EEE, BUET to realize this project. On January 29, 2021, the project finally got launched with modifications to address the present day needs of the department. The target is to achieve a fund of $500,000 raised within the year 2025 for the scholarship project from the contribution of the EE/EEE alumni members.
Although BUET is the best engineering institute in Bangladesh in terms of the quality of teachers and students, there are scopes of significant enhancement in terms of research outcome. One of the major challenges to this end is the lack of sufficient funding for research. Usually, students enrolled in MSc Engg./Ph.D. program carry out the thesis/research work on a part-time basis besides their regular job. This in effect limits their ability to provide enough time and effort in conducting research. The objective of this grant/scholarship is to promote postgraduate research outcomes of the Department of EEE. Besides providing significant financial support to the award winners, it will be a matter of respect for the students in the community and will light up a sense of responsibility towards the community from which the future generation will benefit. Furthermore, the practice of research proposal writing will encourage the students to be updated with cutting edge research. Therefore, the specific outcomes for the awards include:
Besides, a portion of the collected funds will be used to support the development of ‘Mohammad Ali Choudhury Power Electronics Laboratory’ in BUET.
Only current full-time postgraduate students (M.Sc. Engg/Ph.D. (EEE)) of the EEE department are eligible to get the scholarship.
Every year, one student/students will be the recipient(s) of Prof. Mohammad Ali Choudhury Memorial award and one student/students will be the recipient(s) of EEE Alumni Excellence award. The award money will be approximately 35,000 BDT/month for three academic semesters for MSc Engg./Ph.D. students. Based on performance, Ph.D. students will have the opportunity to apply for the renewal of the award for another three academic semesters. Awardees will also receive a certificate signed by the Head of the Department of EEE (ex-officio) as well. An ‘Award Ceremony’ will be organized in hybrid/in-person mode by the Department of EEE, BUET. The cost involved in the certification process and award ceremony will be carried out by the scholarship fund.
20% of the collected funds (up to 50 lac BDT) will be utilized for the development of ‘Mohammad Ali Choudhury Power Electronics Laboratory.’ It can be noted that the Department of EEE, BUET has prepared a proposal for establishing this laboratory with the approval of BUGS (Board of Undergraduate Studies). The proposed funds will help to complete the project.
The scholarship recipients will be selected by a Working Committee through blind review process. This working committee will be comprised of the following members:
This committee will finalize the list of scholarship recipients at the end of each semester.
The EEE Department has taken initiatives to form the EEE BUET alumni association. The EEE BUET alumni association will take the initiatives for fund-raising. If needed, the association will take help of Ankur International for fund raising. A simple one-page website will be created and maintained with information about the mission/vision, committee details, list of scholarship recipients, updates on lab development and link to donate money to the fund. -Donors residing in Bangladesh or living abroad will be able to directly deposit their donations to the official bank account of BUET as described below:
-Alternately, donor living abroad can also donate using the following steps:
-go to eee.buet.ac.bd page and find the link to the initiative’s webpage
-find the link to donate through Ankur International from the initiative’s webpage Click Here
-foreign alumni members can use PayPal/debit/credit cards; members in Bangladesh can use ‘sslcommerz’ link for the same. The donor info like name, HSC/intermediate batch, contact details, donation amount will be recorded for book-keeping purposes only.
-Ankur International will update the Department of EEE, BUET and the BUET alumni association on the status of raised funds on a regular basis.
-Upon request from BUET, the Ankur International will transfer collected funds to the mentioned official bank account of BUET.
-Upon request, the Department of EEE will issue a letter of Acknowledgment to the Contributor(s)
A new bank account has been created at Sonali Bank, BUET with the name: “EEE Alumni Award” for this scholarship plus the lab development fund.