Emory employees and retirees contributed more than $105 million during Campaign Emory, the University's history-making, seven-year effort to support teaching, research, scholarship, patient care and social action.
More than 4,500 employees made gifts during Campaign Emory, which raised nearly $1.7 billion. The campaign is the most ambitious fundraising effort in the University's history.
Launched in February 2010, the employee annual giving program MyEmory had an initial goal to raise $50 million by the end of 2012. Employees stepped up and achieved the initial goal by Sept. 30, 2010. Employee and retiree donors nearly doubled that amount by the end of the campaign.
Over the course of Campaign Emory, participation in the MyEmory employee annual giving program has risen to 24 percent—up from 15 percent in March 2010—with thousands of Emory employees and retirees choosing to make their charitable contributions to the areas at Emory that mean the most to them.
"These investments—combined with the professional and personal contributions employees make each day—are helping Emory continue to excel," says Ginger Cain '77C-'82G, director of public programs for Emory Libraries, who is co-chair of MyEmory with Sally Lehr '65N-'76MN, a clinical associate professor in the Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing.
"Employees' enthusiasm and belief in what Emory will accomplish with these resources is an inspiration to donors everywhere to get involved," Lehr adds.
The many gifts made by Emory employees and retirees include:
• Jim Gavin '70PhD, a member of the Emory Board of Trustees and clinical professor of medicine at Emory School of Medicine, made a bequest to support the James T. Laney School of Graduate Studies. His gift honors Emory President Emeritus James T. Laney, for whom the school is named, and celebrates the leadership of Dean Lisa Tedesco.
• As a tribute to his late father, retired Emory surgeon Ira Ferguson Jr. '52M provided a $250,000 gift to create the annual Ira A. Ferguson Lecture. Ira A. Ferguson Sr. '23M was the first of three generations to attend Emory. He went on to become a professor and chief of surgery at Grady Memorial Hospital.
• John McGowan, a faculty member in both the Rollins School of Public Health and Emory School of Medicine, and his wife, Linda Kay McGowan, established the John E. and Doris W. McGowan Scholarship to provide tuition support for a student earning an MD/MPH degree.
• Rollins School of Public Health Professor Michael Kutner made a gift to endow the Michael H. Kutner Award for Excellence in Biostatistics, which will recognize an RSPH graduate for distinguished achievement in the field, and the Michael H. Kutner Fund for Biostatistics to support outstanding PhD candidates in the Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics. Kutner has spent more than 35 years at Emory as a biostatistician, professor, author and administrator.
• Randall K. Burkett, curator for the African American Collections in Emory's Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, and his wife, retired librarian Nancy Burkett, donated much of their personal store of rare historical materials to the library.
• Associate Professor of Political Science Larry Taulbee issued a challenge in 2011 to raise funds for the Department of Political Science. He contributed $10,000 in matching funds for 2011 and 2012 and plans to match another $5,000 in 2013, 2014 and 2015.
• Emory Professor Emeritus of Classics Herbert W. Benario made a leadership gift of $10,000 to kick off fundraising to establish an endowed visiting lectureship that will attract a series of prominent scholars to campus.
• Emory School of Medicine Department of Dermatology Chair Robert Swerlick and former associate professor Carl Washington led an effort to establish the Thomas J. Lawley, MD Fund in Dermatology in honor of former dean Thomas J. Lawley. The group raised $1 million to endow the fund through personal gifts and contributions from alumni, faculty, staff and friends, and from Lawley and his wife, Chris Lawley.
• Emory physician leaders Bill Eley, Ray Dingledine, Doug Morris, Bill Casarella, and others are helping establish an endowment for the Thomas J. Lawley, MD Scholarship for medical and allied health students.
For more information on the success of Campaign Emory, visit giving.emory.edu.