A Generous Estate Gift to Come From Anonymous Donor
A donor who wishes to remain anonymous has generously included UHCL in their estate plans. Years ago, this anonymous donor established an endowed scholarship and has made annual contributions since that time. At the time the estate gift is received, the funds will be added to this endowment. Scholarships will be awarded to students pursuing STEM degrees based on merit with a preference given to graduates of the donor’s high school alma mater.
The donor best describes the motivation for the gift, “It seems to me that those students who are successful in athletics normally receive the most recognition and the largest scholarships for their athletic abilities, more than for their scholastic abilities. Students with financial needs and good scholastic abilities seem to have the edge in getting scholarships, often based more so on their needs and other non-academic factors. Yet, often there are excellent academic students that are overlooked, because they may not quite meet financial need or other criteria. With the seed planted on my graduation night, I later decided that if I had the means, I wanted to set up an endowment that could provide scholarships for excellent students who are overlooked. I felt I fell in that category at the time of my high school graduation. With my class’s highest math and science scores for the four years of high school, I was awarded $175, hardly equivalent to a four-year scholarship. While in school I investigated scholarships, but I found that my parent’s income was too high for me to qualify. My mom was a stay-at-home mom and my dad was a plumber, neither of which completed high school.”
