By CANDACE MIERS

Staff Writer

The College of Engineering and Science honored Dr. Les Guice, vice president for research and development and director of information technology, Sept. 25 at Squire Creek during the first of the college's tri-annual meetings, with a $20,000 endowment to Tech's BEST Scholars Fund.

"I knew that people were honored at these meetings, but I had no idea that one of those people would be me," Guice said.

The BEST Scholars Fund, which stands for Building Engineers and Scientists for Tomorrow, was started by Guice in 1999 to support the students of engineering and science.

"Growth of equipment and resources in our college has been substantial," Dr. Jim Palmer, a professor of chemical engineering, said. "It was nice to recognize the high quality of work that Dr. Guice has done."

The group reviews all the applications of entering freshmen in the College of Engineering and Science to decide which students deserve scholarships from the fund. Then the faculty and administration work together to decide how the scholarships are given out.

"The fund, which generates on principle, has about $400,000 for scholarships," Guice said.

While the growth may be recognized by the college, some students know nothing about the growth of the BEST fund.

"If there is a fund that helps engineers, I never heard anything about it," Joseph Easley, a sophomore civil engineering major, said.

Tiffany McAllister, a freshman biomedical engineering major, said she is just as unaware of the BEST Scholars Fund as Easley.

"I honestly had no idea there was any kind of scholarship program for engineering," McAllister said.

Easley said he wishes he had known something about the scholarship opportunities available when he came to Tech.

"It would have been nice to have some financial support for college [coming into school]," Easley said. "I don't know how students are supposed to find out what's going on if there are no advertisements like posters or something hanging around."

While no big posters are advertising the fund, the six-year existence of the BEST Scholars Fund has continued to grow and give engineering and science students scholarships.

"Dr. Guice is an outstanding person with good vision," Dr. Jenna Carpenter, an associate professor of mathematics and statistics, said. "He is [the] man to bring the [College of Engineering and Science] to new heights with the fund."