Corporate Giving
12
Philanthropy Journal of North Carolina
On the upswing?
After several flat years, a few large
U.S. corporations are increasing their
giving budgets, including Ford Motor
Co. and Westinghouse.
March
College endowments
Insurance agents pledge $750,000 for scholarships
By Sean Bailey
Raleigh
A North Carolina insurance trade
association has pledged $750,000 to
endow business scholarships at 15
colleges in the University of North
Carolina System.
Over the next 15 years, the
Independent Insurance Agents of
North Carolina will deliver $50,000 to
each university to endow a scholar
ship for students pursuing a degree
in business or insurance.
The endowment pledge repre
sents an increased commitment to
North Carolina higher education by
the insurance association. Fbr more
than 25 years, the group has awarded
more than 50 annual scholarships of
$1,000 to North Carolina students.
Robert F. Bird, executive vice
president of the association, says the
group has decided to change its
approach to funding scholarships for
several reasons. First, he says, the
group realized that the $1,000 schol
arships were not sufficient given
today’s cost of higher education.
Second, the association concluded
that administering scholarships was
an activity better accomplished by
the universities and not the insurance
association.
“We’re not in the scholarship busi
ness and it just started to get, admin
istratively, bigger than we could han
dle,” he says.
In recent years the association
has been receiving more than 300
applications for the scholarships.
Finally, Bird says, it just made sense
to have the financial aid staffs at each
school handle the process and award
the scholarships, which are based on
need and merit.
Each university that receives an
endowment will be directed to fund
an annual undergraduate scholar
ship in the name of the Independent
Insurance Agents of North Carolina.
The scholarships are intended for
students pursuing a degree in insur
ance or risk management. If such a
program does not exist at the univer
sity, the scholarship will be awarded
to someone pursuing a degree in
business.
Each university will establish
other criteria for the scholarship. The
scholarship will be funded with the
interest from the endowments.
Universities that will receive an
endowment are; Appalachian State
University, East Carolina University,
Elizabeth City State University,
Fayetteville State University, N.C.
A&T State University, N.C. Central
University, N.C. State University,
Pembroke State University, UNC-
Asheville, UNC-Chapel Hill, UNC-
Charlotte, UNC-Greensboro, UNC-
Wilmington, Western Carolina
University and Winston-Salem State
University
NFL star endows
family institute at UNC
By Merrill Wolf
A former University of North
Carolina football star, now a National
Football League standout, honored
his late father in February by jump-
starting a new interdisciplinary pro
gram for families at UNC’s School of
Social Work.
Harris Barton, a 1987 UNC gradu
ate who is now a tackle for the San
Francisco 49ers, gave the school a
$100,000 endowment toward a $2.5
million campaign goal for its planned
Institute for FamiUes. Interest from
the gift, reportedly the university’s
largest ever from a professional ath
lete, will provide scholarships and
support research, training and other
programs.
In addition, a conference room in
the School of Social Work’s new
buUding on the Chapel HiU campus
has been named for Barton’s father,
Paul C Barton. An Atlanta salesman
who was diagnosed with brain cancer
when his son was a high school
senior, the elder Barton underwent 13
years of treatment before he died in
1994.
Previously, Barton and his son
had filmed two promotional spots for
the United Way to raise money for
brain-cancer research.
Harris Barton says that instead of
supporting UNC’s athletic program,
he chose the School of SocM Work -
and family programs in particular -
because family was so important to
his father.
“My father was a great lover of
families,” he says. “He loved whatev
er was good in life....but he was not a
sports fan.”
Richard Edwards, the school’s
dean, says the new Institute for
Families will unite family-related
research, education and outreach
efforts from several disciplines. The
Paul C Barton Conference Room wiU
promote an interdisciplinary
approach to programs for families
and children, he says, and will be
used by a variety of campus and local
agencies.
Barton, who has played on three
49ers teams that have won the Super
Bowl, contacted the School of Social
Work at the suggestion of Dean
Smith, coach of the men’s basketball
team at UNC-CH. Smith and his wife
Linnea, a child psychiatrist, are long
time supporters of campus programs
that help children and families.
The School of Social Work last
summer began looking for funding for
the new institute, according to inter
im director Mark Fraser. One of its
first initiatives will be a violence-pre-
Harris Barton
vention program that has received
start-up funding from the Z. Smith
Reynolds Foundation.
Between 1984 and 1994, Fraser
says, youth violence in North
Carolina doubled, increasing at
almost three times the national rate.
The new program, which will be
developed and tested in Catawba,
Cumberland, Durham and New
Hanover counties, will draw on the
resources and expertise of public
schools, mental health agencies, local
departments of social services, and
universities.
“We want to bring together... all of
those people to think about and col
laborate on innovative projects to
prevent youth violence,” Fraser says.
For information, call Edwards, the
dean, at (919) 962-6468.
Promoting success
United Way, TV
team up for kids
Awareness is at the heart of an
initiative to improve the lives of
young children.
By Todd Cohen
The Triangle United Way and
WRAL-TV have launched a two-year
initiative to increase awareness
about and access to services for chil
dren from birth to six years old.
The initiative, which is modeled
on those in other U.S. cities, including
Charlotte (see story, page 10), will
include public-service announce
ments and programming on WRAL
and referral by the United Way to
local services.
“Those years between conception
and age six are critical to the success
and fulfillment in life for children,”
says Waltye Rasulala, pubhc affairs
director for WRAL, which for many
years has focused its public-service
programming on children’s Issues.
“The whole community has to be
involved in seeing that these children
reach their full potential.”
The Trian^e project, which began
in January, will continue throu^ the
end of 1997. The Triangle United Way
CHILDREN
initially wiU provide staffing support
to help identify and coordinate
resources for chUdren in the region,
and to refer famUies to those
resources.
A broad-based committee is being
formed that will create a strategic
plan for the initiative and develop a
project or series of projects around
chUdren’s issues.
MeanwhUe, WRAL wUl air four
programs this year and next - some
times in conjunction with call-in seg
ments - along with public-service
announcements. The first program,
on homelessness, already has been
broadcast. 'The other three programs
this year wUl focus on teenage sex,
pregnancy and parenthood; health
issues; and programs to help young
chUdren succeed against overwhelm
ing odds. The programs were pro
duced by Hears! Broadcasting in
cooperation with the United Way of
the Massachusetts Bay Area.
Corporate sponsors for the
Triangle project are Sprint CeUular
and Kaiser Permanente.
National AIDS nonprofit, corporate groups merge
Two of the nation’s leading AIDS
organizations have merged to better
address the needs of people affected
by the AIDS epidemic.
The boards of the National AIDS
Fund and the National Leadership
Coalition on AIDS - both in
Washington, D.C. - have formed a
newly-constituted National AIDS
Fund with a network of more than
200 corporations and nonprofits.
The merger brings together two
groups that have served different
needs arising from the spread of the
AIDS virus.
The National AIDS Fund was cre
ated in 1988 by the Ford Foundation
and nine other national foundations
and corporations. Since then, it has
given out nearly $50 mUlion in grants
to local communities for AIDS pro
grams and services - including sup
port for the HIV/AIDS Regional
Consortium in Charlotte.
The National Leadership
Coalition on AIDS was formed to help
employers better manage AIDS in the
workplace and educate employees
about preventing the spread of the
virus that causes AIDS.
The joining of the two organiza
tions is a recognition that “business
must become a key player in this
nation’s response to AIDS,” says
Enoch Prow, senior vice president in
Atlanta tor Charlotte-based
NationsBank and chairman of the
newly merged AIDS Fund board.
“Businesses recognize that their
most valuable asset - their employees
- are at risk of contracting HI\(” says
Prow, whose bank has been one of the
principal corporate supporters of the
National AIDS Fund. He was sched
uled to speak to the Charlotte-based
AIDS Consortium in February
Paula Van Ness, president of the
AIDS fund, agrees. “Bringing the
business community and local com
munities together in the fight against
AIDS is the single biggest step we can
take in ending the epidemic,” she
says. “Some of the most effective
community-based AIDS programs in
the nation will now have the chance
to get even better and more respon
sive as a result of this merger.”
Call the National AIDS Fund at
(202) 408-1818.
Arts council gives
business awards
United Arts Council of
Raleigh and Wake County
and the Greater Raleigh
Chamber of Commerce have
announced their seventh
annual Business Support of
the Arts Awards. Winners are:
Mr. and Mrs. James T. Fair;
Carolina Power & Light Co.;
KPMG Peat Marwick; and
Arts Together, Inc.
Rex Healthcare teams
up with soccer league
Rex Healthcare in Raleigh
distributed more than 800
first aid kits and an hour of
free sports medicine advice to
interested Capital Area
Soccer League coaches in
February. The collaboration
helped coaches brush up on
first aid skills, says David
Allred, spokesman for the
league.
NationsBank helps put
college on-line
Gifts from NationsBank and
the Hillsdale Fund of
Greensboro have helped
Greensboro College get on
the Internet. NationsBank
gave $ 100,000 to the pro
ject and the Hillsdale Fund
gave $25,000. The college is
now on the World Wide Web
at: http:/www.gborocol-
lege.edu.
Marketing effort aids
accountants
Woodward Communications
of Wake Forest has begun
work on a three-year market
ing campaign for the N.C.
Assoc, of Certified Public
Accountants.
Hunt announces leadership graduates
Gov. Jim Hunt has
announced graduates of
Leadership North Carolina 11.
The program is designed to
help potential new leaders
understand the state's social
and economic challenges.
The new class of 40 partici
pants was selected from a
large pool of applicants from
the public, private and non
profit sectors. Among them
were Brian Keith Burwell,
executive director of the
Environmental Federation of
N.C.; William H. Rohe, pro
fessor of urban studies at
UNC-CH; and Richard
Tyrone Williams, general
manager, business and com
munity relations for Duke
Power Co.