OUR MISSION: Helping students launch their future
Our goal at Friends of Fullerton College Foundation is SUSTAINABILITY
Sustainability of Scholarships:
We are working to build a $10 Million endowment for student scholarships that will provide $350,000 in scholarships every year to our students in PERPETUITY! In just one year we were able to double our endowment to almost $3 Million!
You can help us reach this goal by contributing to our programs: Start a scholarship, give to an existing scholarship, give to our emergency grants program, o
r just give to “most-needed” with the DONATE button.
Sustainability of Programs:
We have started a Classroom-to-Jobsite Pipeline where students get scholarships to a trade program, get placed with an apprenticeship program upon completion, and the employer pays a fee that funds the next student’s scholarships. In this way, trade program scholarships are self-funded and lead to students being employed directly from college. Our first program is the first drone pilot apprenticeship program in the country! Read more about this program in our Annual Report.
Sustainability of Students:
In 2021, we began an Emergency Grants program for students. When the foundation did a listening tour and evaluation for our strategic plan, we spoke with every staff and faculty member at the college and asked them what, if anything, they wanted the foundation to do differently. The number one request? Emergency grant funds.
Students have a myriad of obstacles that come up during the school year. A few hundred dollars can make the difference between dropping out and graduating. Such stumbling blocks can drastically alter their future. A student needs to pay bills now but financial aid won’t come for a few months. A student is banned from their parents’ home and becomes homeless. A student has a death in the family forcing them to go back to work. This results in them failing a class, triggering a hold on their financial aid. A student can’t afford the final fees needed to get their certificate allowing them to work. A student with a rare disability needs a license for special software that the DSS Center doesn’t have. These are just some of many things that happen to students every year. Such issues don’t fit neatly into a scholarship but can change a life. Some of these can just be a small microloan needed to get through the semester and will be repaid by financial aid.
Bill & Pat, the McGarvey brothers and Hornet alumni, get it. Together they gave $50,000 to start an emergency grants fund. That fund is now over $180,000, meaning that each year we can give out $6,300 for emergencies. Organizations like Waltmar Foundation and Fullerton Rotary also gave over $15,500 in emergency grants this past year.
Can you help us with Emergency Grant Funding?
For a full accounting of what we are doing, see our Three-Year Strategic Plan and Annual Report
Why Community College? See our STATS
“Had this (community college) not been an option, I don’t believe I would have had a clear path forward for the education I wanted.”