Josie E Rewald Memorial Scholarship

Introducing the Josie E. Rewald Memorial Scholarship Campaign: An Endowed Scholarship to Aid Women Pursuing Technology via Community College

Josie E. Rewald Memorial Scholarship Fiscal Year 2018 Status: $0 out of $5000 goal

Still need: ~$20,000 to meet final program goal of $25,000 for endowed scholarship.

In September 2016, our dear friend and SWE Life Member, Josie E. Rewald, passed away un-expectantly. Everyone who knew Josie is saddened by the passing of a wonderful leader and mentor in SWE Detroit and at General Motors (GM). Josie was committed to excellence, and her record of accomplishment during her career was stellar. She was very interested in mentoring students and early career engineers, in particular women. She served as a mentor to many at GM and SWE Detroit, as well as those in and outside of her community. 

SWE Detroit wants to honor Josie’s commitment to engineering and to the education of aspiring engineers. Our idea is to raise $25,000 in 1-2 years to create an endowed scholarship, the Josie E. Rewald Memorial Scholarship. After one year of interest, the endowment would provide an annual $1,000 scholarship to deserving young women entering a community college to pursue a career in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM). The scholarship would be a first for the Society and enable support to young women who may not be able to start their path into engineering directly via a university or college.  To make our goal a reality in a short amount of time, Pat Hillberg, Josie’s husband, has seeded our efforts with $5,000 and has agreed to match up to $10,000 additional for the scholarship. Thus making our goal to raise $10,000 over the next 2 years.  To see our status, check out our updates on the SWE Detroit Online Blog (http://swedetroit.blogspot.com/). 

SWE Detroit would select the candidates with our local process and SWE Headquarters would support administration by validating our recipient(s) are entering programs which articulate into accredited institutions with an engineering program and sending the check to the school.

Separate from SWE Detroit’s Member Solicitation Program, the following categories created based on Josie’s favorite hiking trails* will be used to acknowledge the support of those who wish to contribute to the scholarship. The suggested donation amount is $200 each year to reach the $25,000 needed for an endowed scholarship. You may choose to make a single contribution or multiple contributions. We will send out reminders each year. Contributions will be tracked and your level will be determined based on accumulated contributions received by SWE Detroit.

Kalalau Trail $1000 +

Jackson Hole $750 to $999

Mount Roberts $500 to $749

Dog Mountain $250 to $499

Highline Loop $50 to $249

*See information about the hiking trails and their significance to Josie & Pat in the images below.


Our programs and services are enhanced and energized by your support of SWE Detroit and SWE’s mission. Remember that your donation is fully deductible under US Internal Revenue Code section 501(c)(3). Please contact us via email at swe_detroit@swe.org if you have any questions.


To donate online go to www.swedetroit.org and click on the “Donate” button or by mail, send a check to
Society of Women Engineers – Detroit, PO Box 2978, Southfield, MI 48037 and place in the comments or
memo section “Josie E. Rewald”.

To donate via check: mail the check to Society of Women Engineers – Detroit, PO Box 2978, Southfield, MI 48037 and place in the memo section “Josie E. Rewald”.

If you have any questions, are interested in supporting the SWE Detroit SWE 4 Life Program, or creating your own endowed program to build a pipeline or legacy to benefit SWE Detroit Programs, please contact Lisa Purvis, Jenny Partlan, Anne Kamenju, or Jennifer Morikawa at swe_detroit@swe.org.