Arizona nonprofit and industry partner launch master’s scholarships for Native American students

PHOENIX – An Arizona nonprofit is continuing its partnership with mining company Freeport-McMoRan to help Native American students further their college educations.

Education Forward Arizona and Freeport expanded the “Native American Scholarship Program” to give $10,000 to students seeking master’s degrees, in addition to scholarships for undergraduate students.

For this school year, 15 master’s degree students received the money, nine of which are first timers for the program. They will attend universities across the nation and in Arizona.

Another 65 scholarships have also been awarded, outside of the master’s degree expansion.

Students also receive academic support and mentorship from Education Forward.

“For the past few years now, Freeport-McMoRan has funded, and we’ve distributed on their behalf, about $2.8 million dollars to Native American students all over Arizona,” President and CEO of the nonprofit Rich Nickel said.

Nickel said this year they decided to expand the scholarship program to graduate students because there’s a lack of private scholarships at that level of college.

“They (Freeport-McMoRan) started thinking about facilitate these graduate degrees that would go on and have impact on those communities,” Nickel said.

President of the Freeport-McMoRan Foundation Tracy Bame said in a press release that this will help uplift Native American communities, as well as the overall state’s workforce.

The long-term goal of the expansion, which focuses on where Freeport operates their large mining operations, prioritizes these tribes:

• Hualapai Tribe
• Navajo Nation
• San Carlos Apache Tribe
• Tohono O’odham Nation
• White Mountain Apache Tribe

However, 14 tribes in Arizona can get the scholarship.

Further funding for the scholarships is already greenlit, with next year’s applications expected to open in February.

Nickel said this expansion comes as the organization closes in on a key milestone for Arizona’s education and workforce.

“We’re actually going to be celebrating in the fall of 2025 our 1,000th scholar who has graduated,” Nickel said.

Learn more about the program here.