How Is My Gift Used?

How Annual Giving Makes an Impact
Annual giving helps to support nearly every area of the University, from teaching and research to student life to public service and outreach. When you support your passion by making a contribution, your gift will be put to work where you choose. How do gifts from you and other MY-D-CAVs make an impact? Here’s a sampling of ways recent annual gifts are making their mark on U.Va.

1. Access UVA.  Annual giving helps to provide the $16 million needed each year to fund this bold financial aid program, which will keep a U.Va. education affordable for all students who qualify for admission, regardless of economic circumstance. To learn more about this groundbreaking plan, visit the Financial Aid Web site.

2. Study Abroad. The University of Virginia’s College at Wise has used annual funds to give students the opportunity to study abroad and experience one of the most rewarding academic endeavors of their college years. The College at Wise offers international travel opportunities to Turkey, Spain, France, and Austria. The School of Architecture helped first-year graduate students in architecture and landscape architecture travel to Barcelona with their professors to study the micro-topography of twelve urban neighborhoods. In the School of Nursing, funds from annual giving allowed several students to participate in a three-week internship at Oxford.

3. Graduate Fellowships. Even with its national reputation for excellence, U.Va. must compete with other top schools for the brightest graduate students. At the Curry School of Education, annual gifts helped to fund several graduate fellowships, which the dean successfully used to attract gifted students to the school. A President’s Fellowship, partially funded through the Arts & Sciences annual fund, allowed psychology graduate student Liz Dunn to concentrate on her research, which has been published in top-notch journals.

4. Lecture Series. The School of Architecture hosted two lectures, which brought nationally recognized figures to the school. Landscape architect Ann Rockefeller Roberts (Architecture ’88) and her daughter, photographer Mary Louise Pierson, spoke on their book, The Rockefeller Family Home, Kykuit. New York architect, Rafael Viñoly, whose firm created the Tokyo International Forum and the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in Philadelphia, discussed his recent projects and his design for the Kennedy Center Plaza in Washington, D.C.

5. Student Research. In the School of Engineering and Applied Science, annual gifts provide cash awards to students and advisors who win the school’s Undergraduate Research and Design Symposium thesis competition. The competition gives students the opportunity to showcase the high-quality research involved in their mentored thesis projects, the capstone of the University’s engineering experience. Annual funds also provide support for the luncheon and a reception for participants and their families, advisors, and judges.

6. The Arts. Annual gifts routinely support the University’s arts programs, from productions of the Heritage Repertory Theatre and the Charlottesville and University Symphony Orchestra to the work of the student docents at the University of Virginia Art Museum. In addition, annual funds help fund the museum’s First Friday receptions where community members gather to view new exhibitions and to socialize.  Annual funds also helped finance the museum exhibition, “The Jefferson Suite,” an installation by multimedia artist Carrie Mae Weems.

 7. Technology for Learning. Annual gifts helped to support the creation of digital gazetteers of Virginia and Tibet. The University Library's Geostat Center has developed The Digital Gazetteer of Virginia, a project that allows researchers to find aerial photos, maps, satellite images, and other map-related information for over 51,000 Virginia localities. Working with scholars of Tibetan culture, a similar gazateer documenting over 2,000 Tibetan villages, monastaries, and other religious sites has been developed for the Tibetan and Himalayan Digital Library. In the coming years, both gazetteers will be expanded to include more sites of historic significance as well as documents, photographs, and other information.

8. The Academical Village. Funds from annual giving supported an archaeological investigation of the Pavillion VII garden that yielded new information about the historic Lawn of Thomas Jefferson’s Academical Village. Following up on a find made while investigating Pavilion III’s garden, archaeologists Benjamin Ford (GSAS ’98) and Stephen Thompson (College ’82, GSAS ’99) discovered evidence of walls that once stood behind the Pavilion VII garden. These findings may indicate that at least some of the Pavilion gardens were originally larger than previously thought.

9. Library Services. The University Library employs more students than any school or unit on Grounds, and to function smoothly, it relies heavily on the day-to-day assistance that students provide. Annual gifts to the Library help to compensate student employees for their hard work and improve library services for the entire University community.