Historic cash gift left for Colorado College to increase financial aid options gazette.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from gazette.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Beginning next fall, Colorado College will expand its scholarship program for in-state students by increasing qualification to families earning up to $250,000 annually in adjusted gross income.
About one-quarter of this year’s 415 undergraduate students who live in Colorado qualified for the Colorado Pledge program for the 2021-22 academic year, officials said.
They collectively received $4.3 million in tuition, room and board, through waived and discounted charges, depending on household income level.
The private, liberal arts school launched the pilot program in 2019, with the goal of increasing enrollment of low- and middle-income students from Colorado.
The program has three levels of scholarship awards.
Colorado College has received a $33.5 million bequest from an anonymous living donor, making it the largest single contribution from an individual in the liberal art school’s 147-year history, officials said.
Half of the unrestricted funds will be applied toward future needs of the college, and the other half will benefit the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College, Molly Bodnar, the campus’ associate vice president and campaign director, said Tuesday.
The money will be released upon the donor’s death, officials said.
The donor made the bequest, showing “gratitude for the powerful impact the college has on its students including our efforts toward antiracism and becoming more accessible,” Mike Edmonds, acting co-president of the college, said in announcing the news.