With 1K+ Donors, NC State College of Education Has Record Year of Giving in 2017-18

RALEIGH, N.C.–The NC State College of Education received gifts and pledges totaling $4,680,964 from 1,047 donors during fiscal year 2017-18. The number of donors is the highest total the college has had in its 90-year history, and the dollar amount in gifts is the most since at least 2003. The total number of donors bests the previous high, set in 2005, by nearly 20 percent (876).

“Our 2017-18 academic year, our 90th, has been extraordinary, and this announcement of the incredible support of our donors serves as a wonderful and fitting capstone to our year-long celebration of 90 Years of NC State Education,” said NC State College of Education Dean Mary Ann Danowitz. “Because of donors, we have been able to provide financial support to more students and enrich their experiential learning both within and beyond the classroom, as well as enable our faculty to convert their research into action and apply it in the communities that need them most. Thanks to donors, we are poised to further advance our mission and enhance our impact to improve the educational outcomes of all learners across North Carolina, the nation and the world.”

Here’s a look at five development-related activities that helped make NC State Education’s 2017-18 a record-breaking year for giving:

1) Meeting The $90,000 Challenge. All 19 members of the NC State College of Education Board made a gift to the college in the past year and issued the $90,000 Challenge in Spring 2018 to encourage others to join them in celebrating 90 Years of NC State Education. The Board pledged it would give at least $90,000 to support students and programs across the college if alumni, students, faculty and staff met three goals:

1. 1. The Board challenged them to submit at least 90 stories about why they chose education. They submitted 157 stories.
   2. The Board challenged them to submit at least 90 photos showing their NC State Education pride. They submitted 353 photos.
   3. The Board challenged them to make at least 900 gifts to the college. They made 1,047 gifts.

Just as the alumni, students, faculty and staff exceeded the $90,000 Challenge goals, the Board also exceeded in how much they ended up giving and pledging to the college in the past year: $105,800.

2) Giving Back by Faculty and Staff. An unprecedented 85.5 percent of the college’s faculty and staff made a gift to the college within the past year. Collectively, 171 faculty and staff gave $42,249.

3) Establishing Four New Scholarships and Financial Awards. Donors endowed four new scholarships in the past year:

• Over 20 retired faculty came together to create the Retired Faculty Scholarship Endowment, which will provide financial assistance to one undergraduate and one graduate student each year.
• Rick Elmore ’92 and Linda Coy-Elmore ’91 created the Carlone, Godwin, Stone Scholarship Endowment to provide merit-based scholarships to undergraduate students and honor their friends and educators Heidi Carlone ’91, a professor of science education at UNC-Greensboro; Lisa Brown Godwin, the 2017 North Carolina Teacher of the Year who teaches kindergarten in Onslow County; and Jocelyn Tejano Stone ’91, ’92, who taught middle school science, reading and high school biology.
• Carl E. Harris ’98 EDD is building an endowment to establish the Carl Harris Scholarship and provide need-based scholarships to undergraduate students. Harris is a member of the NC State College of Education Board and a former deputy assistant secretary of education who worked more than 30 years in the North Carolina public schools as a teacher, assistant principal, principal, assistant superintendent and superintendent.
• Dean Mary Ann Danowitz established the College of Education Study Abroad Award to provide support for international experiences for students, such as research trips, conferences and credit-bearing study abroad.

4) Getting a Student Boost. Nearly 100 students made gifts totaling $6,654.94 in the past year. Of those, 45 percent were gifts from students who graduated in May 2018, and they contributed over $5,800. That’s the largest total number and total dollar amount of gifts from graduating students in a year since records have been kept.

5) Starting the Dean’s Innovation Fund. Donor support enabled the college to establish the Dean’s Innovation Fund to enhance faculty’s ability to better convert their research into action and make their findings more useful and accessible to education professionals across the state and nation.The fund supported three faculty members in its first year:

• Associate Professor of Literacy Education Dennis Davis relocated The Literacy Space to an off-campus location in Raleigh to provide easier access for the children and families who participate in the inquiry-based reading tutoring program.
• Professor of Science Education Meg Blanchard is writing a book for practitioners about how to design and sustain effective STEM Clubs in high-need schools. With support from the National Science Foundation, she and her team previously started an innovative STEM Club intervention program in four rural public schools in North Carolina.
• Assistant Professor of Counselor Education Adria Dunbar has been testing Apprentice, a web-based mobile application that centralizes aspects of supervising interns into one program, including the collection of paperwork and recordings, dissemination of readings, and tracking of student progress. She plans to improve the user experience and expand the software for use in professional training beyond counselor education.

See more examples of the students, programs, faculty and initiatives that donors support in the video 5 Reasons Why We’ve Had a #LightItRed Capstone to Our 90th Year: