May 2006 ISSUE
FOUNDATIOn update
A Tale of Two Education Foundations
BY ANDY GILLILAND, P.ENG.
Education Foundation President and Columnist
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THE BIG CHEQUE |
Last month we presented the vision of the APEGGA Education Foundation as a potentially self-sufficient organization, one that is strong enough to develop and deliver an awards program of real value and benefit to aspiring engineering and geoscience students. That is the aim of the board of the Foundation as we move into a new year.
Consider, if you will, the case of two foundations. In the first case potential donors to the capital fund see a strong capital base, professional management of fund assets, and worthy and inspiring objectives of value to the community in whatever the field of fund interest.
In the second case, the same potential donors to the capital fund see a small capital base, insufficient to support the award programs offered by the fund, professional management of fund assets, and worthy and inspiring objectives of value to the community in the field of fund interest. In the competitive world of capital fundraising, there is no question about which is the likely recipient of any new funds.
The APEGGA Education Foundation is like the second of my two examples. We have survived for nearly 10 years and delivered excellent award programs, only because APEGGA has chosen to flow funds each year to provide the necessary resources. We have operated as a flow-through type fund, which until very recently has had a very small capital base.
Operationally, the model works. However, it does not provide the foundation with an adequate model to present to potential donors when they consider their charitable options. Individual donors have been generous in their support for the foundation, which has helped significantly, but it is the ongoing and annual support from APEGGA that has enabled the majority of the award program.
That is the significance of the physically very large cheque presented to the foundation at the recent Summit Awards. Symbolically, that cheque represents the enabling support from APEGGA, which includes, this year, additional support for the foundation capital base.
Thank you APEGGA for that support — we will invest it well and use the resources to assist some of the brightest students in Alberta to become engineers and geoscientists.
Now, as we move ahead, we hope to build upon the emerging capital base of the foundation and move to the first case example of the two funds presented above. There can be no doubt that we have worthy and inspiring objectives for the foundation.
We do have professional fund management, and we will create a strong capital base sufficient to support the award program if APEGGA and its members continue to support us. New awards will be possible when we have the discretionary income to support them.
Thank you all for your contributions to the APEGGA Foundation.