The Molly Rose PPL Scholarship is recommencing with applications now being accepted. Created as an initiative to encourage young women to consider a career in aviation, the scholarship is named after Molly Rose, a pioneering aviatrix who inspired the book and feature film ‘Attagirls’, detailing her time in the Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) during World War II.
The successful winner of the scholarship will obtain her flying training with the Marshall owned Cambridge Aero Club, which was founded in 1930 by Molly Rose’s brother Sir Arthur Marshall.
Commenting on the scholarship, Paul Olavesen-Stabb, the author, and partner of Aetheris Films and Aetheris Publishing, said: “With the forthcoming publication of the book, Attagirls, I am determined that there should be a legacy. This view was shared by Molly Rose’s family business, Marshall of Cambridge. We are extremely grateful that Marshall of Cambridge is financially supporting this, the inaugural training scholarship in association with Cambridge Aero Club. We hope to develop the initiative in the coming years to embrace opportunities within the commercial sector with support from additional companies in the world of aviation.
“The scholarship is synonymous with Molly’s story. She was not afraid to embrace opportunities that during that time were exclusive to men. She was an apprentice engineer at her father’s company and thereafter a pilot, and at a time when it was extremely rare for women to take on such roles.
“The message of the book Attagirls is one of ‘courage under pressure’ a message for young women to have the courage to embrace an opportunity despite its challenges – the challenges being an arena which is predominantly male oriented.”
Terry Holloway, the Managing Director of the Cambridge Aero Club, said: “I flew Molly Rose to Farnborough to the SBAC show in the Marshall twin-engined Aztec some 60 years after she had last handled the controls of an aeroplane and quite deliberately flew her over Luton and White Waltham where she had been based as an ATA pilot.
“On the way back to Cambridge on what was a delightfully still evening I invited her to fly the aeroplane. She initially declined but then said she would ‘give it a go’. She flew the aeroplane for around 30 minutes demonstrating great skill, and at about 200 feet on the final approach to land turned to me and said to me: I think you had better take over now and do the landing dear!”
“My late mother would be smiling down and thrilled with the setting up of the Attagirls Molly Rose Pilot Scholarship,” added her eldest son, Graham Rose. “She enjoyed her visits to, for
example, RAF Brize Norton, and she would hope more women would be in the air both in military and commercial airlines.”
Molly delivered 486 aircraft during her time in the ATA, across 36 aircraft types, including Spitfires, Hurricanes, Wellingtons and Bostons. The first winner of the scholarship was 17-year-old student Georgia Pescod from Cambridge, who was awarded her PPL scholarship in 2021. Georgia was selected from five finalists who attended interviews and undertook trial flights, and she received full pilot training at the Cambridge Aero Club over the summer months with all costs covered, amounting to around £15,000.
The application window for the 2023/24 scholarship is now open until November 2023. The scholarship providers say that the application process is very straight-forward and must include the following:
• A résumé of experience and qualifications (no more than two pages)
• A typed 500-word essay providing personal background info, and describing why you would like to be awarded the scholarship
• Details of any flying experience
• Two (one-page) letters of recommendation
The essay should include details such as what has motivated you to pursue a career in aviation; what you hope to achieve in the next few years; how the scholarship will help your ambitions; and what you intend to do after gaining a PPL.
www.aetheris.co.uk/mrps
Image accredited to Molly Rose PPL Scholarship
