2023 ANNUAL REPORT - MEL DOUGLASS FUND
Scholarships
- We awarded two $10,000 Mel Douglass Scholarships. The winners were Daniela Strauss, now at Tulane University, and Graham Walace, now at the University of Pittsburgh.
- Rowan Cain, Daniel Kochupura, Lucas Kyle, Tristan Marinch, Sebastion Sora, Hannah Werner, and Benjamin Winslow each earned $1,500 honorable mention scholarships.
- Over the fund’s 16-year history, your contributions have supported 95 Edgewood students (18 Mel Douglass Scholarship winners plus 77 honorable mention winners) who enrolled in 54 colleges and universities located in 19 states and Washington DC. Our 95 winners volunteered a combined total of over 42,500 hours of community service before graduating from high school.
- 120 of you donated over $48,000 to the Fund, which assured our sixteenth consecutive year of financial success and sustainability.
- Over 230 individuals, families, or organizations have contributed to the Fund since our inception in 2008. We are extremely proud to recognize and celebrate all who have honored Mel with donations. Our donors from 2018 through 2023 are listed on the back of this page. All of our donors and scholarship winners since 2008 are displayed on our website (meldouglassfund.org).
- The Mel Douglass Memorial golf event on August 12th drew 126 players and was our most successful fundraiser ever. Gregg Bowers and Nick Kefalos always deserve thanks for their tremendous leadership of this event. Thanks for a sensational day, guys! Our 2024 golf event will take place on August 10th at Manor Valley Golf Course. Also, our Board of Directors would like to thank you in person by again hosting our annual Donor Appreciation Party the night before at Grand View Golf Club. Please save those two dates and plan to make it a weekend…more details to follow!
- As always, 100% of your contributions were directed to current or future scholarships. All expenses to operate the fund are personally paid by our Board members. These expenses include our Donor Appreciation Party, tax filings, student and donor communications, website design and maintenance, graphics, printing, and postage.
- We again hosted our Donor Appreciation Party. The August 11 event at Grand View Golf Club was attended by approximately 50 donors and scholarship recipients.
- We strengthened and diversified our leadership team by adding Sarah Bartlebaugh, Peter Belechak, and Jen Morris to our Board of Directors. Profiles of our new board members are enclosed.
- As always, we aligned all of our activities to build an endowment that is self-sustaining in perpetuity to make sure Mel’s legacy endures and continues to benefit young people in Edgewood. Once again we balanced short-term and long-term financial objectives:
- Short-term: We financially supported all of the scholarships awarded and met all of our other financial, legal, and administrative obligations to operate the fund.
- Long-term: We set aside a portion of your contributions to sustain our endowment. Thanks to you, our endowment remains healthy.
