From the beginning in 1956, the Pennsbury Scholarship Foundation Board of Directors recognized that they would have to be more than an organization that ran some fundraisers and distributed the money raised in the form of scholarships. They would have to build an endowment fund and become an organization that effectively seeks donations and endowments, prudently manages the endowments and distributes scholarships from earnings on the endowments and from donations and student loan repayments.
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Note that repayment of no-interest loans are applied to the following year’s scholarships and, therefore, do not contribute to the endowment fund.
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The Pennsbury Scholarship Foundation founders, at their organizational meeting in 1955, set an endowment fund goal of $1 million. This goal was achieved in 1997.
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The first gift to the Foundation was $250 late in 1956 by the Yardley-Makefield Optimist Club. That was followed by a Pennsbury Education Association donation of $400 and $200 from the Yardley Makefield Lions Club. The first Treasurer, Clayton Mills, who was Treasurer for 25 years, would retain at least 25% of the income each year for the endowment fund.
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In 1968 the Hayes Memorial Scholarship Fund, now known as the Hayes Trust, was established with a base in excess of $225,000. Interest from this fund is distributed to students based on financial need, and demonstrated excellence in character, leadership and scholastic ability. Each of these must be given equal consideration. These are the criteria used since that time for all scholarship selections.
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Along the way there were donations of stocks that the Foundation itself managed. In the mid-1980’s the Foundation received an anonymous gift of $134,000.
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Prudent management of these funds by the Foundation allowed it to weather the stock market’s ups and downs. One fortunate financial move occurred in 1987 just before the market crash on October 19. The Treasurer, Earl A. Mead, in order to reduce risk in the funds, fortuitously exchanged stocks held by the Foundation for Certificates of Deposit just weeks before the crash, thus avoiding a very significant loss to the Foundation.
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In 1997 Director Tom Engleman proposed a Endowed Namesake Scholarship program where a sponsor could establish an endowed scholarship for $15,000 that would provide for a $1,000 scholarship each year in perpetuity. After some initial resistance by the Board to allow naming of scholarships by people other than the Board, the program was approved in 1998, and the first Endowed Namesake Scholarship was awarded the same year. That program has grown to over 50 scholarships in 2024, thus adding some $800,000 to the endowment base.
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In 2005 the Foundation received $800,000 from the estate of Joan Falconi Farrell, a former Pennsbury English teacher for 33 years.
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Since 2003 the Foundation’s Investment Committee has worked with Anthony Petsis, a registered financial consultant, to carefully manage risk in the investments portfolio, other than the Hayes Trust, and to provide a target amount of distributions each year for scholarships.
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As of 2024 the amounts in the Hayes Trust and in the Petsis accounts total in the order of $3.7 million.
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Compiled from writings about the history of the PSF by Wanda Long and other archives of the PSF. - Hal Long