Great Scot December 2019 Great Scot 158_December_ONLINE | Page 56

FOUNDATION
much more of a partnership, built on trust and a unified
vision for Scotch. There is also a momentum built into this
strategic vision, with each piece fitting carefully into the
whole while being respectful of the needs of the boys and
staff, and aware of the dangers of ‘building fatigue’.
The culture of giving, enhanced by the major
developments of the Sir Zelman Cowen Centre for
Science, the Spencer Centre for Design and Technology,
and the two amazing Giving Days which raised more than
$2 million for the Tony Briggs Indigenous Scholarship
Fund and the General Sir John Monash Scholarship
Fund, has resulted in almost 400 new members joining
the Foundation since 2012, with a total of some 1800
members at the various levels today. This makes Scotch
unique, I suspect, among other schools in Australia, and
says so much about the strength of the Scotch Family.
One further key development in our fundraising model
has been around the commitments we make when
engaged in a project. The Foundation undertook to raise
a large percentage of the costs of the Centre for Science,
the Spencer Centre, the Keon-Cohen Dining Hall and the
Archives Museum/OSCA House Project – while building
the scholarship program. These have been large figures
and since 2012 more than $56 million has been raised
in commitments to both capital works and scholarship
endowment.
The work to ensure that Scotch is at the forefront of
education for boys in Australia never stops, and nor does
the work of the Foundation. We no longer take a deep
breath when we have completed a major fundraising effort,
but we reflect on our achievements, and the ways in which
we have engaged with more and more members of our
truly fantastic Scotch Family, and we draw breath merely
to work towards the next goal. We know that all we have
here on our Hawthorn campus has been achieved through
the generosity and on the shoulders of those who have
gone before us, and we understand our own obligation to
repay our gratitude to those visionary investors in Scotch
by paying forward ourselves for the next generations of
Scotch boys.
Thank you all for your support this year, and for your
continuing generosity in the future.
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Great Scot Issue 158 – December 2019