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Last week, Michigan fifth-year senior linebacker and future aerospace engineer Noah Furbush was awarded the National Football Foundation (NFF) Coach Bo Schembechler - University of Michigan Scholarship, worth $10,000.
It is the first time the scholarship is being awarded.
NFF President and CEO Steve Hatchell says the scholarship was the creation of former Michigan athletic director Bill Martin, who got together with several others that were close to Schembechler to turn the idea into a reality. It took three years for it to become fully endowed, and is now expected to be given out each year to a member of the Michigan football team, as long as there is a candidate that qualifies.
Furbush will graduate this spring before embarking on a one-year graduate degree in aerospace engineering. He'll be focusing on the space engineering side.
“No more airplanes, just rockets and spacecraft,” Furbush said.
The scholarship will allow him to explore a number of different things related to his degree.
“There are so many cool things happening right now in the aerospace industry in general, but especially in space,” Furbush said. “You have billionaires sending their own sports cars into space, so many cool things. In New Zealand, they’re 3D printing rockets for a couple million [dollars]. It’s incredible the kind of things that are happening right now.
“To be able to have resources available to explore all those exciting opportunities that I’ll have with this master’s program is amazing.”
The NFF has awarded scholarships to student athletes since 1959, including one to former UCLA Bruin, Mark Harmon, who is an actor on NCIS and narrated the Amazon series “All Or Nothing” on Michigan football.
The Schembechler scholarship will be award each spring to a member of the U-M football team that is a contributor on the field — not just a bench player — and has at least a 3.2 grade point average in school. Hatchell says community service is also a plus.
The school will nominate the athlete it views as being worthy of the scholarship to the NFF, which then can make it official.
“If you’re on the football team at Michigan and contribute, that’s as high as it gets,” Hatchell said. “That’s as big time and significant a football team as there is. To do as well as he did academically at an institution that is terrific like Michigan, means that this is an outstanding person in all regards. He’s not just a good football player, not just a good student, he’s the whole package.”
Michigan was strongly behind Furbush and felt he’d be a great first recipient of the honor.
“When you can stand out as a real leader in both football and in the classroom, it’s very special,” Hatchell said. “In this day in time with so much cynicism, we like to turn around and say wait a second, take a look at Noah. You want to see a guy that can get it done? He can play at Michigan and be a great student at a great institution. It’s a huge statement.”
Furbush says that one day he’d love to go into space and believes that it is more feasible now than ever, and could be even more so in 10 years, when there are more programs that put civilians into space.
He has a dream of going to Mars, but if he could pick anything to do, it’d be something a little different.
“If we’re really out there, I think it’d be cool to experience inter-stellar travel,” Furbush.
It’s safe to say his knowledge of both the real world and football will help out the Wolverines defense this season, with Furbush slated to be a key contributor once again. Before football season, however, he will be an intern at Ford (at the Dearborn plant) in the research and development area.
“I think it’s going to give me a really refined look at what engineering is like, working in an industry that’s been around for so long,” Furbush said. “It’s going to be a great opportunity for me.”
Furbush has one final year of eligibility. Last fall, he had 30 tackles, 2.5 tackles for loss, one sack, one interception and recovered two fumbles — including one for a touchdown in the season opener against Florida.
“Our whole goal is to recognize that you can play at a high level, be a great student and go on to be a leader in our country,” Hatchell said.
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