In 1980, nearly 40 years after the wartime incarceration of all Japanese living on the West Coast, a small group of New England Japanese Americans established a scholarship program called the Nisei Student Relocation Commemorative Fund (NSRC Fund). They were all Nisei, second generation American-born descendants of Japanese immigrants. The NSRC Fund honors the Nisei and and pays tribute to the individuals and organizations who reached across racial differences and wartime hatred to help the Nisei students.

The NSRC Fund is a national scholarship program created to address the needs of the Southeast Asian community, an important and growing part of many American cities. A major challenge facing these families is finding resources to support their children's educational goals. The NSRC Fund travels to a different community each year offering scholarships to graduating Southeast Asian high school students.