Rutgers University Foundation

Alumni Leo and Patti Schoffer met while they were Rutgers students in the 1970s, and the university has been an important part of their lives ever since. They recently made a major commitment to Rutgers by creating the Leo B. Schoffer Family Scholarship, which will help athletes from Atlantic County attend Rutgers. "We wanted to create a lasting connection between our family and Rutgers – something that will be permanent," Leo explains. Both Leo and Patti have fond memories of their college experiences and keep their love of Rutgers alive with frequent trips from their home in Atlantic County's Margate City to basketball games at the Louis Brown Athletic Center and football games at Rutgers Stadium.

Judge's Many Admirers Fund Scholarship

The number of people who are providing student Jessica Cornett with her full-tuition scholarship at the Rutgers School of Law-Newark is countless. That's because she holds the Morris Pashman Endowed Scholarship, funded by the large number of friends and colleagues, as well as family, of the late Morris Pashman. Justice Pashman, who graduated from the law school in 1935, served 28 years on the bench, 10 of them as an associate justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court. He was respected and admired throughout the state's legal community as a judge who cared about all people. Jessica, now in her second year of law school, says that the sterling reputation of the judge "is an inspiration to me to practice socially responsible law and maintain an awareness of my duty to those less fortunate."

Monies for the scholarship fund were raised through an initial gift from Justice Pashman before his death in 1999 and from all those who attended special fund-raising events in recent years, including a golf tournament in September 2006. Jessica Cornett is thankful to them all. So is the first recipient of the Pashman scholarship, Terry D. Johnson, a 2004 Rutgers law school graduate. Now an associate with the Dechert law firm in Princeton, Terry deeply appreciates the "vote of confidence in my abilities" that the scholarship represented as well as the financial resources it provided.

Lending a Strong Hand in Post-Katrina Rebuilding

Created with gifts and bequests from inventor Henry Ford and his son, Edsel Ford, in the 1930s and '40s, the Ford Foundation works to strengthen democratic values, reduce poverty and injustice, promote international cooperation, and advance human achievement. Over the past three decades, the Ford Foundation has funded well over $15 million in projects across the Rutgers campuses, including the Center for Women's Global Leadership, the Center for Historical Analysis, and the Center for State Constitutional Studies.

As part of its mission to alleviate poverty and injustice, the Ford Foundation has given more than $900,000 to Rutgers' Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy to help Gulf Coast organizations and leaders address the recovery needs of the region's most disadvantaged communities in the wake of hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Dr. Roland Anglin, a faculty fellow at the Bloustein School, is leading the project, which focuses on community and economic development, leadership development, and philanthropy. The Rutgers award is part of the Ford Foundation's $23 million in grants to community organizations and higher education institutions for post-Katrina rebuilding efforts.

"We have already established Rutgers as an important actor in post-Katrina thinking and learning around regional and community transformation," Dr. Anglin says. "We are able to bring people together. They are starting the wonderful and rich conversation that is needed to rethink how the region should develop."

A "Eureka Moment" Prompts Generosity

For veterinarian James Dougherty, who graduated from Rutgers College in 1974, the realization hit all at once. While cleaning out papers and memorabilia from his long-ago days as an undergraduate, he suddenly recalled that "Rutgers and the state of New Jersey had paid for my college education, including the money I spent to live on." The renewed awareness "really gave me pause. It dawned on me right then and there that I had to pay that back. With interest." The realization turned into the James F. Dougherty Endowed Scholarship, which provides financial assistance to full-time Rutgers College students based on academic merit.

"I knew tuition had risen since I attended school," Dr. Dougherty says, "and I thought about how there was probably a student out there who was struggling with the same kind of decision that I had faced about whether I could afford to attend college." Indeed, there was: The first scholarship recipient was Michael Reyna, who graduated from Rutgers in 2005 and is now a medical student at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. Five students benefited from the scholarship in 2005-2006, with three continuing as recipients this year, and additional awards to be made soon.

Donors Promote Academic Excellence

When Rutgers alumnus Jack O'Malley and his wife, Mary, decided to make a major gift to the Camden campus, where Dr. O'Malley began his undergraduate studies, they endowed an Academic Excellence Fund with $100,000. This year's proceeds from the O'Malley endowment are providing four scholarships to freshmen at the Honors College at Rutgers-Camden, but future proceeds can be used in any number of ways.

The dean of the Camden College of Arts and Sciences thinks that is terrific. "The O'Malleys have been very generous in giving the college a great deal of latitude to use the funds as new priorities arise," says Dr. Margaret Marsh, herself a graduate of the Camden College as well as the Graduate School-New Brunswick.

"Our campus is in a period of transformation," Dean Marsh continues. "The O'Malley Fund, in particular, will allow us to meet new challenges and set new goals."

That pleases Dr. O'Malley. He also draws great satisfaction from knowing that, over the years, his endowment will help students who, like him, are the first in their family to attend college.

"When I was a student," Dr. O'Malley recalls, "the people who were there with me were often the first members of their families to go to college. Their graduation started it all for them and for future generations of their family. Rutgers-Camden is still doing that for kids in South Jersey today. It is making a difference in the future of whole families, and I like that."

Very Giving People

Creating a Lasting Connection

Judge's Many Admirers Fund Scholarship

Lending a Strong Hand in Post-Katrina Rebuilding

A "Eureka Moment" Prompts Generosity

Donors Promote Academic Excellence