I N V E ST I N E XC E L L E N C E
Donor support helps Bryant finish strong I
n a uniquely challenging year, the Bryant community came together as one, united in resilience and generosity as donors supported Bryant in record breaking ways. Nearly 6,100 alumni, students, parents, faculty, staff and friends contributed more than $7,150,000 during the fiscal year, including a record 475 donors who gave at the Bryant Leadership Council ($1,000+) level. These gifts enabled Bryant to move forward, helping to minimize program disruption, maintaining health and safety, retaining academic excellence and ensuring that the Bryant student experience remained vibrant and accessible. And, in a year like no other, October 28, 2020 was a day like no other. Bryant Giving Day brought the Bryant community together in pride, spirit and philanthropy as never before. In 24 hours, the event raised a record $1,058,977 from a record 2,303 donors — an increase of 850 donors from the previous year. Challenge gifts from generous Bryant Game Changers — Board of Trustees Chairman David
Support for the Be Bryant Strong campaign was a critical part of this success throughout the year, with contributions providing vital resources during the rapid shift to remote and hybrid learning and then during the carefully coordinated campus reopening in January 2021. Thanks, in part, to more than 1,536 gifts totaling over $615,000, Bryant was able to make critical investments in rapid, on-site COVID-19 testing, remote learning technology, campus-wide health and safety, and additional tuition aid for students. These investments made Bryant one of the few higher education institutions in the region to offer continuity for in-person learning while providing a campus experience with robust and varied co-curricular activities. Underwritten by their generous gift, the opening of the Marion ’81 and
and several anonymous donors — helped create excitement and inspired unprecedented participation. “One million dollars is a stunning accomplishment,” said David Wegrzyn ’86, P’23, Vice President for University Advancement “It was humbling to see the power of our community on Bryant Giving Day.”
in early 2021 was one of several enhancements to outdoor and distanced recreational programming that helped keep students healthy and united the campus community. Bryant pride was on display at the We Are Bryant Virtual Race, a new event begun in 2020 and one of the ways the Bryant community quickly mobilized in flexible and creative ways to ensure a top-tier
TOTAL GIFTS & PLEDGES
$7,156,634
’85 & Terry Beirne, Michael ’67 & Karen Fisher, Bryant Trustee Joe ’80 and Kathi (Jurewicz) Puishys ’81,
educational experience for Bryant students. The event rallied support for the Bryant
COVID-19 Fund,
A record
475
Strengthened by a second $25,000 donor participation gift challenge from
Daniel ’03 and
which received gifts Tanya Rice the from more than coordinated outreach Bryant Leadership Council 600 donors totaling of our Finish Strong -level donors nearly $460,000, campaign pushed providing flexibility the total number of for allocating additional donors to the goal of tuition aid and enabling 6,100, with many alumni Bryant to offer scholarships to inspired to make their first students facing unexpected gift to Bryant. In coordination with pandemic-related financial hardships. President Gittell’s first Presidential “Contributions to the COVID-19 Fund appeal in May, Bryant Trustee Joe helped provide struggling students Puishys ’80 and Kathi (Jurewicz) with the opportunity to enroll at or Puishys ’81 made a generous continue their education at Bryant,” $50,000 gift to match fiscal-year-end said Ed Magro, Executive Director of contributions from other Bryant Development at Bryant. “These donors, dollar for dollar. Along with gifts changed lives.” critical unrestricted dollars, these Last month marked gifts increased overall donor giving the return of the participation. Nora Marzocchi, President’s Cup Golf Director of the Bryant Fund, believes Tournament, with the significant increase in parents renewed support giving, in particular, was a reflection anchored by a of overall satisfaction with Bryant’s $25,000 gift from institution-wide efforts to ensure that Trustee Daniel ‘03 students could return to the classroom and Tanya Rice, despite the challenges of reopening matching all in-event the campus. “Families were grateful to contributions and know their students could safely learn winning auction bids. This and be part of all Bryant has to offer,” year’s sold-out event at Newport she said. “We all worked together Country Club welcomed additional to ensure that students could make the participants through a new Virtual Golf most of their Bryant experience.” Clinic, expanding the participation Support from corporate partners of the tournament now in its 17th year. and foundations continued to Thanks to support from presenting increase, highlighted by a $1.26 sponsor Amica Insurance, successful million gift from the Hassenfeld live and silent auctions, and more Family Foundation to continue than 130 participants, the tournament Bryant’s Hassenfeld Institute for raised more than $265,000 for the Public Leadership, and a $200,000 President’s Scholarship Fund, gift from the Roddy Foundation to expanding access to Bryant through launch the new Center For Health tuition aid for top-performing students. continues on page 10
A record
926
GIFTS FROM
student families
Frank Hauck ’81, P’08 Ice Rink
AAA Northeast’s partnership with Bryant is an investment in the future W
ith its recent participation in several Bryant programs and events, AAA Northeast continues to expand its engagement with Bryant in a collaborative partnership that benefits both organizations. The top-down investment in Bryant, led by President and CEO John Galvin ’91MBA, has allowed AAA Northeast to partner with the University in a unique way that has helped them to support University priorities while they identify and recruit Bryant graduates who can bring innovative ideas to their organization. As a corporate partner of the Design Thinking Process course at Bryant, company executives served as mentors throughout the semester to six student teams who used design thinking principles to help AAA Northeast attract and retain younger members. At the end of the semester, top executives from AAA Northeast served as judges as the student teams presented their final projects, evaluating the teams on their use of innovative, human-centered
6 Engage | July 2021
solutions to expand AAA’s reach to young adults and utilizing newly proposed web-based tools and social
We’re proud to support Bryant, and we’re excited about the future of our partnership. AAA NORTHEAST PRESIDENT AND CEO JOHN GALVIN ’91MBA media engagement strategies. A generous contribution from AAA Northeast provided prize money to be shared among the top three student teams, but the judges were so impressed by the quality of the presentations that Galvin announced the awarding of additional prize money to be split among the remaining three teams, saying “it was inspiring to see how each team approached this challenge. They all did a fantastic job, and we’re grateful for their hard work and creativity.” AAA Northeast has previously
sponsored Bryant’s IDEA (Innovation and Design Experience for All) program, part of Bryant’s immersive and uniquely integrated First-Year Gateway Experience, which advances design thinking, curiosity, critical thinking and the creativity needed to solve real-world problems. For the past four years, the organization has also been active in Bryant’s Data
Science program, working with faculty to provide students with real business problems and opportunities to explore big data sets and develop the skills needed to manage, interpret and gain insights in the analytics and big data lifecycle — from problem definition through data acquisition to the presentation of results. AAA Northeast continues on page 11
AAA Northeast is a longstanding Bryant University partner and sponsor, engaging with students both in and out of the classroom.
