Advancement News Winthrop Endowed Fund

Critical to Student Success Hurray for scholarships! A total of more than $1.5 million in scholarships provided crucial funding for Winthrop students in the 2017-18 academic year.

Winthrop’s endowment enriches the entire campus community and enables remarkable students to pursue their dreams. By contributing to the endowment, you strengthen the permanent capital of Winthrop. Your gift establishes an enduring legacy that will benefit students and faculty in perpetuity.

Winthrop’s top endowment priorities include: increasing student scholarships, both need- and talent-based scholarships and endowed funds to support faculty and research experiences. Winthrop’s doors are open to students from a variety of backgrounds and experiences, including first- generation college students.

Check out the story below of how giving in the 2017-18 academic year has influenced, empowered and enabled the student experience at Winthrop:

Alexandra Hettig

Leadership Society The Winthrop Leadership Society

Join the Winthrop

recognizes donors who make annual gifts to Winthrop in one, or multiple, areas for a five-year period. Since its inception, approximately 32 donors have made pledges at one of the following membership levels:

Founders $25,000+

Garnet & Gold $10,000-$24,999

Trustee

$5,000-$9,999 President

Alexandra Hettig, a junior mathematics major from Rock Hill, gives credit to her teachers for caring about her and encouraging her. And it’s just this gift she wants to give to her own students when she becomes a middle school math teacher. As a first-generation student, though, college was not something Hettig found within her reach. She toured Winthrop when she was a high school student, seeing that it would be the best place to pursue her dreams of becoming a teacher, but she still had no way to make it happen. A scholarship offer changed that, and her goals finally felt like they might be within her reach. In her time at Winthrop, Hettig has been a star in the classroom, and during summer 2018, she participated in the Winthrop Initiative for STEM Education (WISE) program for aspiring teachers. With each step, she credits scholarship donors, noting that, “I wouldn’t be able to achieve my dreams of becoming a teacher otherwise.”

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$2,400-$4,999 Blue Line

$1,000-$2,399

Vice President for University Advancement Evan Bohnen welcomes your call, email or letter of interest in joining the Winthrop Leadership Society today! Contact him at bohnene@winthrop.edu, 803/323-2275 or visit www.winthrop.edu/give.

45% of students are eligible for the Pell Grant

70% of students are receiving scholarships

To make a gift that would benefit student scholarships, please call the Division of University Advancement at 803/323-2275 or visit www.winthrop.edu/give.

17 Did You Know?

Close Scholars Commemorate 20 Years of Service

Te Close Scholars Program, established in 1998 by the Springs Close Foundation, is commemorating its 20th anniversary of giving to Winthrop and the surrounding community. One of the program’s hallmarks is to prepare students that are “achievement- oriented, culturally diverse and socially responsible” through civic engagement and responsibility. Winthrop Close Scholars are provided financial assistance, participate in service and enrichment activities, and must meet volunteer and GPA requirements. Te Close Scholars have greatly enriched Winthrop and the surrounding communities throughout the last two decades.

In April, Close Scholars met Anne Springs Close

(third from left), the generous donor whose gift established the Close Scholars program.

Gifts of Note:

Te family of the late Jo Ann Knox ’48 recently earmarked additional funding for the J.A. Knox Scholarship. Te scholarship was established in 2000 by Knox, a former teacher and artist, in memory of her father, John Alexander Knox. Te fund has provided renewable scholarships to students at Winthrop and will continue to help the university recruit and retain high-achieving undergraduate students.

A newly established scholarship will provide assistance to selected students who are nearing graduation but may not have the financial means to complete their degrees. Te Commencement Bridge Scholarship, established by the Winthrop Women’s Coalition, will provide support to undergraduate students who are in or entering their last year at Winthrop and who would be unable to finish their Winthrop degrees without financial assistance. Te coalition established the scholarship and received additional support from a $1,300 contribution from the Winthrop Retirees’ Association.