UA Student Receives Hollings Scholarship

University of Alabama student Nicholas Hayes, of Memphis, Tennessee, will receive the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Ernest F. Hollings Undergraduate Scholarship for 2020-2022.

The scholarship provides a two-year academic award of $9,500 per year, and a 10-week, full-time, paid summer internship opportunity at any NOAA facility nationwide. Scholars also receive funding to present their NOAA research projects at two national scientific conferences.

The Hollings Scholarship is given in addition to existing awards the student may already receive. Since the program's inception in 2005, more than 36 UA students have been named Hollings Scholars.

Hayes is a Randall Research Scholar pursuing a diverse combination of majors and minors in mathematics, physics, interdisciplinary linguistics, German and computer science. Hayes serves as an undergraduate research assistant for Dr. Firat Soylu, assistant professor of educational psychology and neuroscience, and Dr. Zhe Jiang, assistant professor of computer science.

He contributes to projects focusing on bilingual math cognition, machine learning and spatiotemporal data mining with applications in earth science. Outside of research, Hayes is an Honors College Ambassador, Tide Talks executive team member and co-founder of Tuscaloosa's chapter of the United Nations Association of the United States of America.