{"id":46585,"date":"2019-08-23T07:54:06","date_gmt":"2019-08-23T12:54:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/?p=46585"},"modified":"2019-08-23T07:54:08","modified_gmt":"2019-08-23T12:54:08","slug":"journey-campaign-reaches-88-million","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/?p=46585","title":{"rendered":"Journey campaign reaches $88 million"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By UNIVERSITY RELATIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fort Hays State University and the FHSU Foundation announced today that their five-year capital campaign has raised $88 million toward its $100 million goal to support scholarships, academics, student life and athletics.

Student Government Association President Brad DeMers, a junior political science major from Osceola, Neb., was on hand to testify to the benefit of the scholarship pillar of the campaign.

\u201cFHSU offered me a scholarship, and that was the deciding factor for me,\u201d he said. \u201cI am honored to be up here today speaking on behalf of all FHSU students on the magnitude of our Journey campaign.\u201d

\u201cToday is a big day and I want to thank all of the generous donors and the Fort Hays State Foundation for making the Journey campaign possible. To announce that the campaign is ahead of schedule just proves the dedication our friends, family, alumni and supporters have to this great institution. It\u2019s like no other place,\u201d said DeMers.

DeMers shares the story of his journey to FHSU, and why he ultimately chose to become a Tiger, in this video available on Youtube: https:\/\/bit.ly\/30s6P1z<\/a>.

\u201cThe Journey campaign is the largest, most aggressive campaign in school history,\u201d said Jason Williby, president and CEO of the FHSU Foundation, at a news conference in the university\u2019s Memorial Union to announce the progress of the campaign.

\u201cWe kicked off the campaign in the fall of 2016 with a goal of raising $100 million in support of scholarships, academics, student life and athletics. We are grateful and humbled to have already raised $88 million toward this effort.\u201d

The campaign\u2019s status was announced by alumnus Steve Shields, entrepreneur, Journey campaign co-chair and a trustee of the FHSU Foundation.

\u201cI get the good job,\u201d he said. \u201cI get to announce how well we\u2019re doing. I\u2019m really pleased to announce that we\u2019re not only on schedule, we\u2019re ahead of schedule. As of June 30, we have raised $88 million.\u201d

Shields also shared the story of his goddaughter Lydia, who is a freshman this year on a track scholarship. He said he did not influence her in any way, but asked her why she chose FHSU.

\u201cAnd she said well, she got a track scholarship,\u201d said Shields. \u201cAnd that was good. That helped. But then she said, \u2018You know, the coaches were so personal, so interested in me and they\u2019re interested in more than just how I do in track. I could feel they were interested in being who I wanted to be.\u201d

She also told Shields that the campus is so beautiful, \u201cand it\u2019s growing.\u201d Then, Shields said, she told him, \u201cSo if there\u2019s growth with the university, there\u2019s going to be growth opportunities for me.\u201d

That is also why, Shields said, that he is a member of FHSU\u2019s Wooster Society, whose members have arranged planned gifts, including estate gifts, to the FHSU Foundation.

\u201cEighty-eight down, 12 to go,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is a great university to invest in, and a great university to remember in your estate plans. Fort Hays State University is generously remembered in my estate plans, and I invite you to join me in including FHSU in yours.\u201d

FHSU President Tisa Mason concluded the news conference by thanking the many donors who have contributed to the Journey campaign.

\u201cI am proud to share that our donors have made the dream of a college education an affordable reality for more of our students,\u201d she said. \u201cTo date, your participation in the Journey Campaign allowed us to offer more than $13.8 million in student scholarships.\u201d

\u201cYou have probably heard me or Jason say many times, \u2018All gifts, large and small matter,\u2019 and I am elated to report that of the 58,000 total campaign gifts we have received to date, nearly 22,000 \u2013 more than a third \u2013 \u00a0are gifts under $100. Every gift matters.\u201d

For more information on the Journey campaign and the FHSU Foundation, visit https:\/\/foundation.fhsu.edu\/journey<\/a> or contact the Fort Hays State Foundation by phone at 785-628-5620 or via email to foundation@fhsu.edu<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By UNIVERSITY RELATIONS Fort Hays State University and the FHSU Foundation announced today that their five-year capital campaign has raised $88 million toward its $100… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[11722],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-press-releases"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46585"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46585\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46586,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46585\/revisions\/46586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}