SNU Magazine - Summer 2022

BY MICHELE BARLETTA MBA ‘23

WHAT DO YOU SPEND $5 A MONTH ON? This is all it takes to help a student fund their education at Southern Nazarene University. Thanks to a group of four alumni from the classes of 1962 and ’63, there is now a fund that everyone can afford to support. Tommy Davis, Conley Henderson, Stan Wilkins, and Winford Akins have founded the Little is Much fund, based on the idea that no amount is too small to make a difference.

The thought first came about when Davis found out there are currently more than 33,000 BNC and SNU alumni across the world. It got him thinking, what if every one of them donated just five dollars a month, how much money could he raise?

The math is simple, but the concept is powerful. Five dollars a month equals $60 a year. Multiply that by 33,000 alumni and you get just under two million dollars.

The founders of the group were excited to join, with full confidence in Davis’ idea. Akins explained that the figures did all the talking for themselves when it came to getting him onboard.

Even when you feel like you can give just a little, your five dollars could be a part of something much greater.

Numerous times the scriptures show us that Little is Much when God is in it as the old hymn says. Perhaps the miracle of the five loaves and two fish is the most well-known. “If a lot of people give a little, it truly is much,” Akins explained.

Winford Akins ‘62, Tommy Davis’63, Stan Wilkins’62, Conley Henderson ‘63

Susanna Thang is a new SNU graduate who plans to work in the healthcare field, doing what she describes as God’s work. As someone who benefited from scholarships throughout her time here, Susanna is truly thankful for the generosity shown to her by strangers.

“I am very grateful that God has put someone that I’ve never met in my life to answer my prayers.”

Just $5 a month can lift the financial burden that so many students may face. The monthly donation helps these students on their journey at SNU, bringing them closer to God and helping them realize their goals. The founders of the fund know it may take a while to make a significant impact, but they’re hopeful this will become a fund that will continue to grow for generations to come.

Davis explained how he’d like to see it become an alumni tradition at SNU in the future, perhaps even challenging graduating seniors to support the fund with at least $5 a month as part of their graduation.

“The idea is in the seed stage of life right now; we need people to water it, fertilize it, and maintain it, for it to eventually blossom,” Wilkins said. “It’s like the tortoise and the hare, and we all know who won that race.”

Wilkins often references the poem “A Bag of Tools” by R.L. Sharpe that illustrates exactly what the group is trying to challenge fellow alumni to do: be the steppingstone that helps another person become the person God has planned for them to be.

Help fertilize the seed that these gentlemen have planted by signing up to donate as little as five dollars a month. Your support could be just the steppingstone that another SNU student needs.

Nursing major Skye Ah Yat believes her time at SNU has led her closer to the Lord and was a huge steppingstone to reaching her lifelong dream of helping others.

“Generosity has allowed me to fulfill my dreams of becoming a God-fearing nurse.”

The Little is Much fund aims to make a difference in even more students’ lives at SNU so that each class graduates with less debt than the one before them.

“I can do for someone now, something that they can’t do for themselves,” Henderson said. “I can help them.”

"A Bag of Tools" by R.L. Sharpe

Isn’t it strange

That princes and kings,

And clowns that caper

In sawdust rings,

And common people

Like you and me

Are builders for eternity?

Each is given a bag of tools,

A shapeless mass,

A book of rules;

And each must make—

Ere life is flown—

A stumbling block

Or a steppingstone.