Second Century Endowment Campaign

Case for Support

Progress on Campaign and Details on Donating

At NSAC we place a high priority on ensuring that our students succeed. Our teaching and applied research environment encourages students to assume more responsibility for their own learning, while developing the ability to work with others. The result is a graduate who knows how to get things done.

NSAC graduates are highly sought after—dynamic, motivated, and educated for success in life. A very high percentage of our students are either employed in their area of study or continue their studies within 6 months of graduation. Government, business and industry all turn to NSAC for their future leaders and we have a very active careers services office to help them.

However post secondary education is an expensive investment, student debt loads are increasing and are becoming a barrier to attendance for some. Research has shown that a scholarship and bursary program is important to attracting and retaining students and helping reduce their overall debt load. To continue to attract the best students and produce graduates of the highest caliber, we must strengthen our scholarship and bursary endowments and enhance our support for undergraduate and graduate students.

Alumni Appeal Letter

Nova Scotia Agricultural College
Second Century Endowment Campaign

Dear

The Nova Scotia Agricultural College celebrates its Centennial in 2005. In the 100 years since our founding, we have become an internationally respected institution while still maintaining a small school atmosphere where students receive personalized attention from their professors.

In the next few days, you will be receiving a telephone call from a student or friend of NSAC. They will be calling at our request to discuss the Second Century Endowment Campaign to fund student scholarships and bursaries. We are aware of the significance of this request so we want to take the opportunity to share some thoughts about the importance of scholarships and bursaries to our students today.

As a first-class teaching and research institution NSAC has one of the most modern, best-equipped campuses in Atlantic Canada. Our education model is built around industry-driven applied-science, providing our students with valuable experience in solving real-world problems. Graduate students, through their research, continue to contribute to the knowledge base of agriculture and life science communities, developing new technologies and becoming leaders in their fields of endeavor. It is this quality education and innovative research that also helps attract our students. As globalization and the knowledge based economy become the main drivers in our economy, internationalization assumes a key role in the activities of NSAC. Our students leave campus with the tools that allow them to take their place as key participants in a global economy.
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In 2004, 264 deserving students received scholarship and bursary funding for their studies at NSAC. Governments, alumni, industry organizations and private agriculturally-related companies generously provide this support; however, many of these awards are funded in response to an annual request. As individual and corporate priorities can change, we need to endow these funds to ensure that our awards program is competitive.

Currently, less than ten per cent of our scholarship and bursary funding comes from our endowment. It is the priority of NSAC to have at least 30 per cent funded by the endowment, which would be more in line with other universities and would secure these scholarships well into the future. It is important that the scholarship endowment be sufficient to accommodate increasing student costs at a time when declining interest rates affect the income from endowment that is available for awards.

As you know, NSAC has always been dedicated to providing the best post-secondary education possible to all of our students. Today that remains as true as in the years you attended and is proven in the fact that many of our alumni have gone on to distinguish themselves in public office, government and the private sector. The strength of any great university is evident in its alumni. In many ways, we measure our success by your achievements.

As our students face increased costs for annual tuition and books, we will need to raise the amount of funding they receive to enable them to cover these additional expenses. For example, to provide a student with even $1,000 of annual financial support, an endowment fund of $25,000 is required. That initial $25,000 will ensure the scholarship is available not just for today’s student but also for many future generations. In order to make this possible we need your support in the Second Century Endowment Campaign to significantly grow our endowment fund.

NSAC remains firmly committed to excellence in education. Entrance scholarships enable us to carry out this commitment by attracting the brightest and best students who add so much to the overall quality of classroom discussion. Competition for first year students is intense and scholarships are often the deciding factor. They are clearly researching the level of financial support in both scholarships and bursaries available to them before they make their decision on an institution. I’m sure you would agree on our need for an attractive scholarship program to ensure the most talented students attend our university regardless of their financial situation.

One other area of pressing need is graduate scholarships. Many of our graduating students want to continue their education at NSAC and we are increasingly attracting graduate students from other universities as well. These students contribute significantly to our student body enhancing our overall reputation. NSAC has to be competitive with other post-secondary institutions in the financial support we provide to these scholars. Again, unlike most other post-secondary institutions, our scholarships are funded annually and therefore are subject to cancellation at any time.

NSAC ranks 71 out of 73 Canadian Universities and Colleges reporting in terms of amount of endowed funding. Increasing the amount of funding available from endowments is vital to our ability to compete for students in the years to come.

The Second Century Endowment campaign is a very significant undertaking for a school the size of NSAC. It will take the generous support of all our alumni, friends, staff and industry to help us reach our goal. Please remember however that the Second Century Endowment Campaign does not diminish the need for fund raising for other priorities at NSAC. We appreciate the continued support of those who have given to our annual appeals and other projects, however we hope you’ll consider giving in a significant way to this special Centennial project and help secure student support for the next 100 years of NSAC.

We would like you to consider a gift of $166.66 per year (which equals $13.89 per month) for the next three years, for a total gift of $500 to the Second Century Endowment Campaign.

It is up to us who are part of the NSAC community to be a part of this present effort that will yield future gains. Please take the time to speak to the student or friend of NSAC who will be calling you. By making a gift to the Second Century Endowment Campaign, you will ensure NSAC has the ability to attract and retain the best and brightest students as well as make sure that those who need it most will have the support they need. Your gift becomes a legacy to benefit generations of NSAC students.

Sincerely,

Dick Huggard Class of ‘56	Sherry Porter Class of ‘75