RELEASE- Former Astronaut To Speak @ MSU

The 17th Annual Black Engineer of the Year Awards weekend kicks off with a press conference on Friday, February 14, 10:00 a.m. at Morgan State University's Clarence M. Mitchell Jr. School of Engineering. Featured this year is former NASA astronaut U.S. Navy Captain (Ret.) Winston E. Scott. Captain Scott has been very visible recently providing national television commentary about the Space Shuttle Columbia tragedy. Following his remarks at the press conference, Captain Scott will be the guest lecturer at a forum beginning at 10:45 a.m. The public is invited.

Captain Scott, a trained naval aviator and officer, received his Master of Science degree in aeronautical engineering from the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in 1980. After completing jet training, he served a tour of duty with Fighter Squadron Eighty Four at the Naval Air Station (NAS) in Oceana, Virginia. In 1986, he was designated as an Aerospace Engineering Duty Officer and served as a production test pilot at the Naval Aviation Depot, NAS in Jacksonville, Florida.

After working in many high-level positions, and accumulating more than 4,000 hours of flight time in 20 different military and civilian aircraft, Captain Scott was recruited by NASA in 1992, where he was stationed at the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. While at NASA, he served as a mission specialist on the STS-72 Endeavour in January 1996, a nine-day flight during which the crew retrieved and deployed satellites and conducted two spacewalks. In November 1997, he flew aboard the STS-87 to study how the weightlessness environment of space affects various physical processes, and performed two more spacewalks. He retired from NASA and the U.S. Navy in late July 1999 to accept a position at his alma mater, Florida State University, as Vice President for Student Affairs.

Morgan President Earl S. Richardson, Mr. Tyrone Taborn, editor-in-chief of U.S. Black Engineer & Information Technology Magazine, Mr. Ted Childs, IBM Vice President, and Dr. Eugene M. DeLoatch, dean of the Morgan School of Engineering, will also participate in the press conference. Dean DeLoatch is this year's recipient of the "Pioneer Award," which will be presented at the 2003 Black Engineer of the Year Awards Ceremony on Saturday, February 15, 8:00 p.m. at the Baltimore Convention Center. The awards ceremony, the culminating event of the weekend, is hosted by U.S. Black Engineer & Information Technology Magazine, the Council of Engineering Deans of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and the Lockheed Martin Corporation.

Morgan State University, founded in 1867, is a coeducational institution offering more than 60 academic programs leading to bachelor's degrees as well as programs at the master's and doctoral levels. As Maryland's public urban university, Morgan serves a multi-ethnic and multi-racial student body and seeks to ensure that the doors of higher education are opened as wide as possible to as many as possible. For more information on Morgan State University, visit www.morgan.edu.