GRESHAM - Bob Klopke knew how expensive higher education could be.
He d just sent the youngest of his three daughters off to college, and as principal of the Gresham School, he d seen many other students do the same.
Seeing the success of Shawano s Dollars for Scholars program, which had been raising money for scholarships for high school graduates pursuing post-secondary education since 1993, he thought Gresham students, too, could benefit from a program like this.
So, in 2001, Klopke started sending letters to people in the community he thought would be interested in starting a fund, and holding meetings.
Before Klopke and the group even started asking for donations, he remembered, a farmer who lived just north of town handed him $100 or $200 out of the blue, simply telling him to use this to get the fund going.