Call For Applicants for the 2023 Zale Parry Scholarship.
The Academy of Underwater Arts and Science is currently accepting applications for the 2023 Zale Parry Scholarship. Applicants must be enrolled in a graduate program, Masters or PhD at the time of application. Applications must be submitted by August 31, 2023.
The award will be presented at the 62nd Annual NOGI Awards Banquet on Wednesday, November 15, 2023 at the Marriott Hotel, 555 Canal Street in New Orleans (during this year’s DEMA Show).
About Zale Perry
Parry began diving as a young girl in the 1940s. She was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1933 and raised on a Wisconsin lake, where she learned to swim and fell in love with the water at a young age. While working for the Douglas Aircraft Company in Santa Monica, California, as a young woman, she became involved in pioneering diving and scientific work for Sports Illustrated magazine. She began working as an underwater equipment tester for Scientific Underwater Research Enterprises in 1953. Later, she and her partner (an aeronautical and aquatic engineer named Parry Bivens) designed, built, and marketed the first civilian hyperbaric chamber for divers. They were crusaders for the purchase of hyperbaric chambers all over the world to provide lifesaving facilities for divers suffering from “the bends.”
Parry set a women’s depth record of 209 feet in 1954. When she reached the bottom, she is said to have come to a halt at 209 feet.
Parry’s background extends beyond diving and acting. She is a skilled photographer and writer. She has used her organizational skills to bring underwater photography to the public’s attention. Parry co-founded the International Underwater Film Festival in 1957, which lasted 17 years. She was the first woman elected president of the U/W Photographic Society in 1960.
Parry received the NOGI Award for Distinguished Service, the DEMA Reaching Out Award, the Scuba Diver of the Year Award from the Women’s Scuba Association, and the Los Angeles Parks and Recreation Education Award. The Academy of Underwater Arts and Sciences named Parry a “Lifetime Ambassador at Large” in 2001.
Zale Perry Scholarship Application