Bridgewater, Va. – This year marks the sixth annual fundraising campaign — Day of Giving. Due to COVID-19 protocols, the campaign was hosted completely online this year. This campaign raised a record amount of money with alumni, parents, faculty, students and community members all participating.

Held on Thursday, Mar. 11, the Day of Giving involved a live stream, as well as a 24-hour online site allowing donors to choose a specific fund to donate to — which included athletic teams and academic departments. 

The live stream was hosted by the Bridgewater College athletic department. The live stream was filmed in various locations around campus and lasted a little over six hours. 

Faculty, staff, students and alumni representing several athletic teams, academic departments, boards and campus clubs participated in the live stream — which was broadcasted online at the Kline Campus Center. 

“Day of Giving is important to Bridgewater because fundraising goes on all the time, but it is mostly behind the scenes that faculty, staff and students do not get to see,” said David Bushman, president of Bridgewater College. 

“Day of Giving is a way to make the fundraising very public and remind everyone that we are all a part of this and sometimes the most effective way to talk about the College is for students, faculty and staff to be engaged in a real and effective way,” said Bushman. 

With Day of Giving being a 24-hour online campaign that engaged the entire community in support of Bridgewater College, the College desired to raise morale and inspiration in students as well to support. 

For students who wanted to express their BC pride, there was an option to be entered into a raffle to win BC spirit socks. A randomly selected 100 students who participated by either donating, recording a video via ThankView, or both won the illustrious BC spirit socks. 

To encourage further participation, Maureen Silva, vice president for institutional advancement, sponsored a faculty and staff challenge. Any faculty or staff member who made an online donation between the morning of Mar. 8 to noon of Mar. 10, was entered into a drawing to win both a donut party for their entire department the morning of Day of Giving and a $1,000 donation to their favorite BC fund.

According to the Day of Giving website, Bridgewater College raised more than $300,000 thanks to the 1,024 donors who contributed to their beloved cause. The Lee Foltz Current Scholarship Fund raised the most money — exactly $35,000, while the Bridgewater Fund had the highest number of donors at 110. 

Thanks to the generosity of former BC coaches Jean Willi ’80 and Laura Mapp, this year the Bridgewater College athletic department was able to offer a unique athletic challenge created to increase support and generate revenue for each sports team. 

There were two ways for a team to win up to an additional $4,000: either be the team within the assigned group with the highest percentage of players donating or be the team within the assigned group that raises the most money overall. 

All the sports teams were broken off into three groups, with football being a category of their own. Football had a separate challenge to win up to an additional $2,000 in two ways: if 50% of the players on the roster donated or if the team raised $1,000 and a donor would match the $1,000 as a gift. 

Football, men’s basketball, baseball, and women’s soccer led the athletic department in donations. Women’s soccer led in donors, with 102 participants. Overall, the athletic department raised over $100,000. 

Alongside the athletic challenge, there was also an academic challenge between the individual departments thanks to generosity from Andrew Grossnickle ’02. 

Each academic department competed against other departments in their division for the most alumni participation. The winning department in each of the four divisions received an additional $2,500. 

The Department of Music and the Department of Psychology both raised over $1,000; however, the Department of Economic and Business Administration raised the most amount of money during the 24-hour period. The Department of Music led in donors with 11.  

“One of the biggest challenges this year is not being able to pick up that camaraderie that we usually have throughout the year,” says Grace Keller, senior class president majoring in English and professional writing. 

“We are not able to all go out and hang out together in the tailgating field or anything because of COVID regulations, which makes perfect sense, but it is one of the hardest things to navigate getting to know each other which makes Day of Giving even more important,” said Keller.