Contact: Sammy McDavid
STARKVILLE, Miss.--Mississippi State today [June 30] announced the inaugural selection for a scholastic award that honors the former leader of a subsidiary of the nation's second-largest nuclear generator.
Emily N. Allen of Madison will be the Carolyn C. Shanks/Entergy Mississippi Inc. Endowed Scholar for the 2009-10 school year. Her award is named for MSU alumna Carolyn Shanks, the 1999-2008 president and CEO of Entergy Mississippi Inc.
A Jackson-based power company. Entergy Mississippi is a subsidiary of the New Orleans-based Entergy Corp.
Allen, a sophomore with a double-major in marketing and apparel textile and merchandising, is a graduate of Madison-Ridgeland Academy. An MSU President's Scholar and the daughter of Terry and Donna Allen, she is a member of the MSU Roadrunners student recruiting team and Lambda Sigma sophomore honor society.
A 1983 accounting graduate also of Madison, Shanks was named the 2008 College of Business Alumna of the Year. She currently is senior vice president for administration and corporate support at Enexus Energy Corp., which is becoming the nation's first stand-alone, publicly traded nuclear-energy generating and marketing company.
Also based in Jackson, Enexus will be created by the spinoff of six reactors at five of Entergy Corp.'s nuclear plant sites.
"Entergy's new scholarship honors a College of Business alumna and helps make the dream of a higher education a reality for a deserving business major," said Dean Lynne Richardson.
Shanks expressed her personal congratulations to Allen. "Emily has a very promising future ahead of her, and I am proud that Entergy will be part of it.
"I am deeply honored that Entergy has established this scholarship with my alma mater," Shanks added. "It is very gratifying to know that the scholarship will reward students for their hard work and help them further their education."
Haley R. Fisackerly, current Entergy president and CEO, said the company had a two-fold purpose in creating the scholarship.
"First, we want to honor Carolyn, who provided unsurpassed leadership to the company for nine years," he explained. "Secondly, we wish to help ensure a deserving student is able to afford an education at one of our state's finest universities."
Like Shanks, Fisackerly is a graduate of the College of Business, one of the oldest collegiate business programs in the South and among those accredited nationally by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business.
A previous personal gift from Shanks was used to develop a student team room in the Leo W. Seal Family Business Complex, a major addition to McCool Hall, home of the college and its Richard C. Adkerson School of Accountancy.
The Shanks/Entergy Mississippi Inc. Scholarship is an open fund in the MSU Foundation that may be increased through additional contributions. For more information, contact Jack McCarty, director of development, at 662-325-9580 or jmccarty@foundation.msstate.edu.
For more information about Mississippi State University, see http://www.msstate.edu/.