Thanks to 10,000 donors, Georgia State University shattered its annual fundraising record despite the pandemic’s many disruptions.
The diverse, downtown Atlanta institution raised $66.7 million in the fiscal year that ended June 30, surpassing the previous record of $51.2 million set in 2017.
The funds allowed Georgia State to provide nearly 2,800 hardship grants to help students with food and housing insecurity, tuition shortfalls, transportation issues and other necessities during the COVID crisis. The assistance enabled students to stay on their degree paths, university administrators said.
The university’s National Institute for Student Success and the Student Success Center project also received major gifts from the Woodruff Foundation, Truist Foundation, Kresge Foundation and the A. James & Alice B. Clark Foundation.
Georgia State is renovating the historic Southern Bell Telephone Company in downtown Atlanta to make a home for the center and create a one-stop hub for the university’s student success services.
Some 44 endowed scholarships were also created via Georgia State Foundation’s The State Way Match program, which offered dollar-for-dollar matching funds from a $10 million fund.
“Our remarkable fundraising success in a pandemic year can be directly attributed to the generosity of our supporters —individual donors, as well as our corporate and foundation partners,” said Jay Kahn, vice president of advancement and president of the Georgia State Foundation. “We’re grateful for their trust in The State Way and the importance they place on Georgia State’s institution-wide commitment to serving the diverse needs of our more than 54,000 students.”
