3 New Scholarships Support Students Who Exemplify College of Education’s Mission

One person wants more mathematics educators like her husband. Another wants the College of Education to have a more diverse community. And a third wants others to follow in his late wife’s footsteps and support multicultural education. So all three made recent gifts to endow scholarships to support students in the College of Education who demonstrate the college’s mission to ensure the educational success of all students and to reduce achievement gaps.

The donors share why they made their gifts in the briefs below.

• Council on Multicultural Initiatives and Diversity Scholarship
• Jo-Ann Cohen and Daniel Teague Mathematics Education Scholarship
• The Dr. Jenny Penney Oliver Scholarship

Faculty Member Endows Scholarship to Benefit Underrepresented Groups in College of Education

A faculty member within the NC State College of Education wants to help build a more diverse community within the college that reflects the population of North Carolina. To even their own surprise, the faculty member is doing that by endowing the Council on Multicultural Initiatives and Diversity (COMID) Scholarship through a planned gift of $25,000 and through annual current gifts to begin supporting the scholarship and students now.

“I never knew endowing a scholarship would be a possibility; but by structuring the scholarship as a planned and current gift, it was simple and feasible,” said the faculty member, who wished to remain anonymous. “I hope it’s something more people will consider.

“The scholarship is structured so that even those who choose monthly contributions can see their money put immediately into action through the scholarship,” the faculty member added. “Every year, the amount of money raised that year is passed on to students in the form of scholarships.”

The scholarship provides need-based support to undergraduate students in the College of Education, particularly those from underrepresented groups and those who demonstrate a commitment to work with the African American community.

“Having more diversity within our undergraduate population is important for the experience of all our undergraduates as they learn to be teachers in an environment that reflects the population of our state,” the faculty member said. “It’s also important for elementary students, African American students in particular, who benefit from having a teacher who looks like them at some point in their school years.”

The scholarship is named in honor of COMID, a group comprised of faculty, administrators, deans and students formed in 2007 to support, build and maintain a diverse community within the College of Education and to implement strategies that prepare future educators to be citizens of the world.

[giving-form heading=’Support Our Students’ align=’right’ submit_to=’http://www.go.ncsu.edu/educationgiving’ cta=’Give Today’]Your gift, no matter the size, will directly benefit students and help prepare them to advance the College of Education’s mission to ensure the educational success of all students and reduce achievement gaps.[/giving-form]

New Scholarship Honors Long-time Teachers, Supports Mathematics Education Students

Jo-Ann Cohen, a professor of mathematics at NC State, loves the NC State College of Education’s commitment to breaking the hold of poverty and providing access to higher education. She also wants to see more teachers like Hyman Cohen and Daniel Teague in the world. They are her father and husband, respectively.

So she and Daniel ’97 PHD have pledged $25,000 to endow the Jo-Ann Cohen and Daniel Teague Mathematics Education Scholarship to support undergraduate students in the College of Education who are majoring in mathematics education.

“The college’s mission is an extension of the work of both my father and husband,” Cohen said. “So it is my privilege to be able to help offset the cost of college for the next Hy Cohen and Dan Teague.”

Cohen’s father, the late Hyman Cohen, taught sixth grade in the inner city of Baltimore for 40 years and taught citizenship courses to immigrants at night.

Daniel Teague has taught mathematics at the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics since 1982 and has influenced the teaching of high school mathematics around the country. He completed his Ph.D. in mathematics education at the College of Education.

Dr. Jenny Penney Oliver Remembered Through Scholarship Promoting Teaching, Service

The late Dr. Jenny Penney Oliver ’77, ’83 MS had a passion for teaching, research, learning and service; and she spent much of her career supporting future educators. Now a scholarship her husband, Steve Oliver ’77, ’83 MS, has established in her memory will support students in the NC State College of Education who share her passion.

The Dr. Jenny Penney Oliver Scholarship will benefit students committed to multicultural education and who will be agents for education innovation and student enrichment.

“She was extremely active in encouraging multicultural education in schools and at NC State, and that was one of the reasons I wanted to create a scholarship in her memory — to honor her passion for and contribution to excellent education,” Steve Oliver said.

After receiving her bachelor’s in psychology from NC State, Jenny Penney Oliver was a psychologist assistant at Broughton Hospital in Morganton, North Carolina; earned a master’s in adult education from the College of Education; and worked at Kansas State University, where she earned her Ph.D. in counselor education and educational psychology.

She later was a faculty member in the University of Georgia’s Department of Counseling and Human Development Services. She received the college’s Outstanding Alumni Award in 2004.

“Jenny was the kind of person who set an admirable model for others to follow,” Steve Oliver said. “She was engaged in the community, worked tirelessly to give a voice to the voiceless, and promoted the value of a strong education wherever she went.”