On Sept. 19, the University of St. Thomas announced the largest-ever scholarship gift in the history of Minnesota. Numerous media outlets covered the news.
From the Pioneer Press:
The St. Paul-based Catholic university says a gift from the Schoeneckers Foundation will fund scholarships for 250 undergraduate students every year based on need. They expect the “historic” gift will allow the scholarship endowment to help thousands of students in the future.
The Schoeneckers Foundation declined to disclose the exact size of the donation, but St. Thomas said it was the largest the school has received. The last record donation for scholarships was $50 million in 2017 from the GHR Foundation. At the time it was a record contribution not just for St. Thomas, but Minnesota universities and colleges.
That year, St. Thomas set out to double the size of its scholarship endowment, and in the seven years since it has raised about $220 million, according to school officials. Now, St. Thomas is gearing up for another fundraising push focused on scholarships, something university President Rob Vischer said comes as the cost of education grows.
“One of the pressures we’re navigating now is that today’s college students have a lot greater financial need than past generations did,” he said. “And so what this gift does is it better equips and empowers us to meet the financial needs of today and tomorrow’s prospective students without compromising or jeopardizing the quality of the education we provide.”
From The Minnesota Star Tribune:
On Thursday, the Schoeneckers Foundation gave the University of St. Thomas a generous donation – the largest scholarship gift given to a university in the state’s history and among the five largest-ever donations to a Minnesota university. ...
The endowment will cover “a substantial portion of tuition” for 250 St. Thomas undergraduates every year into perpetuity, University of St. Thomas President Rob Vischer said.
“It’s a tremendous encouragement in any field when you’re passionate about the work you’re doing and others come along to really accelerate ... what you’re doing because they’re so passionate, too,” Vischer said.
From Twin Cities Business magazine:
Larry Schoenecker, son of Guy Schoenecker and another St. Thomas alum, said his family was motivated to make the gift because of the “great need for scholarship help.”
Based on his family’s conversations with the university, he saw that the “biggest need right now is scholarship money because of the price of tuition and the stress on people of lesser incomes.”
“We thought the timing was right for us, so we just stepped up and did it,” said Schoenecker, president of Edina-based BI Worldwide, the business his father launched while still an undergraduate student at St. Thomas.
The Schoenecker name is a familiar one on the St. Thomas campus; the university’s recently opened $110 million building for arts, sciences, and engineering bears the family’s name. The Schoeneckers provided a separate gift to help construct that building.
St. Thomas has received big-ticket donations from other philanthropists over the years, too: In early 2023, the university received an unprecedented $75 million gift from billionaire philanthropists Lee and Penny Anderson to build a new arena.
From the Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal:
“Guy and Barbara Schoenecker truly understood the transformative impact of higher education,” University of St. Thomas President Rob Vischer said in the release. “The Schoenecker family has always believed in the power of the type of life-changing educational experiences our students gain from St. Thomas.” ...
In honor of the gift, the university will rename the Tommie North Residence Hall at the intersection of Selby Avenue and Cleveland Avenue North in St. Paul as the Guy ’49 and Barbara Schoenecker Residence Hall North.
From WCCO Radio:
Steve Simpson (Host): “Boy, how about this story out of St. Thomas. As we celebrate Minnesota’s largest-ever scholarship gift, joining us now we say good morning to Rob Vischer, the University of St. Thomas president. Good morning, Rob, how are you?”
President Rob Vischer: “Good morning. Well, we’re doing great over here in St. Paul.”
Host: “Where did this come from and how did this come about?”
Vischer: “Guy Schoenecker graduated from St. Thomas in 1949 and he credited St. Thomas with changing the course of his life. So in the 75 years since then, he and now his children, have really leaned in to do whatever they can to advance the mission of St. Thomas, and to help keep it affordable and accessible to as many students as possible.”
