New Semiconductor Institute Scholarships To Support Grad Students

The North Texas Semiconductor Institute (NTxSI) at The University of Texas at Dallas has launched a new scholarship program to address the demand for highly skilled engineers in the semiconductor industry.

The NTxSI MS Scholar Program will provide qualified students pursuing master's degrees with tuition, a stipend, an industry-relevant curriculum, a summer research opportunity and access to industry mentors. The program will support 20 full-time students, 10 in each of the academic years beginning in 2026 and 2027.

"The semiconductor industry workforce is projected to grow significantly by 2030 as the U.S. ramps up semiconductor production and innovation onshore," said Dr. Eden Zielinski, assistant director of the NTxSI. "We are excited to be able to offer the North Texas Semiconductor Institute MS Scholar Program to address a shortage of highly skilled workers in this critical industry."

Texas leads the nation in semiconductor exports, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The NTxSI opened in 2023 to accelerate semiconductor innovation and workforce development in the North Texas region, which is home to new and planned manufacturing facilities.

In 2023, the Semiconductor Industry Association projected a need for 12,300 more engineers at the master's degree level by 2030.

As traditional device scaling - the underpinning of Moore's law - comes to an end, other means of achieving advances in performance and reduction in size are required. Moore's law is the observation that the number of transistors on an integrated circuit doubles about every two years, leading to increased computing power and decreased cost. However, integrated circuit technology is reaching its physical limits.

This has led to introduction of new materials and an ongoing transition to advanced heterogeneous integration packaging, which stacks or integrates multiple layers of semiconductor components vertically, rather than side by side, said Dr. Rick Wise, an NTxSI research affiliate.

These changes, combined with massive onshoring of manufacturing, are expected to lead to unprecedented demand for engineers with specialized skills in materials, design and packaging technology, he said.

"This master's program is specifically designed to give students more expertise that will be valuable to meeting this industry need and advancing semiconductor technology," Wise said.

The scholarships are funded by the State of Texas through the Texas Institute for Electronics, a UT Austin-based semiconductor consortium of state and local government, semiconductor and electronics companies, national labs and academic institutions. The vision of the institute is to innovate semiconductor solutions through advanced heterogeneous integration.

Scholarship applicants must be accepted to a UT Dallas materials science and engineering, electrical engineering or mechanical engineering master's degree program in the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science.

Applications will be accepted through Jan. 15. Recipients will be notified in March.

Media Contact: Kim Horner, UT Dallas, 972-883-4463, [email protected], or the Office of Media Relations, UT Dallas, (972) 883-2155, [email protected].