Thank you so much for participating in our Day of Green!
This spring we are creating a general athletics endowed scholarship fund. Our institution provides ample scholarship resources to help our coaches compete in the MIAA and across NCAA DII, but we do have room for growth. Our goal is to have an endowment that allows a sustained and consistent flow of resources to our department and our coaches to maximize their recruiting and retention efforts. It might take quite some time to build a fund that spins off a full scholarship; we understand that. Currently, we are roughly 10 full scholarships short of being a fully-fund DII athletics program. A full out-of-state scholarship is $34,610 for the academic year...however, the average athletic scholarship that we provide to a student-athlete is around $6,000. So, you can see how starting a fund and beginning to lay a foundation for long-term growth in our scholarship allotment can have an impact in the short term but will have its biggest impact years from now. In the current market a $1 million endowment would support one full athletic scholarship...but $150,000 endowed would spin off the average scholarship that we offer to a prospective student.
My intention for this fund is for it to be utilized where it can have the biggest impact. That means if we have an opportunity to attract a high-quality student athlete, and a coach has already maxed out their scholarship allotment, but needs another $2,500, we can provide that for them. Whether it's a star pitcher, point guard, hurdler, wide receiver, goalie, #1 tennis player, or anywhere in between, a fund with this kind of flexibility at our discretion can have an immense impact on our department. However, we don't want to use it too quickly, so we have decided that we are NOT going to pull from this fund until we hit that $150,000 mark. This ensures that we will be able to allocate dollars in an impactful way early on, but also allows us to protect the future and growth of the fund for the long term. With this fund we will be able to supplement the university's generous scholarship investment in Bearcat Athletics.
Our hope is that there are some who are looking for ways to leave a lasting legacy within the Northwest Missouri State Athletic Department for the rest of our institution's history. It has been said that the best time to plant an oak tree was 20 years ago...and the next best time is right now! So that is what we are going to do...and we hope you will join us in establishing this fund. Our athletic leaders are stepping up, putting forward the first $1,000 on Day of Green to seed this fund, and we ask you to join us. During Day of Green, you can still support your favorite program and check out our athletic challenges below.
Thank you for all you do to support our student-athletes and coaches. ONCE a Bearcat, ALWAYS a Bearcat!
God Bless and Go Bearcats,
-AP
