A fundraising effort was launched recently to offer financial aid to students dedicated to advancing the needs and interests of the LGBTQ community. Tom Gaynor ’01 (pictured above), an attorney at DLP Piper in San Francisco who helped to seed the LGBTQ Legal Equality Scholarship Fund explains why he’s taken a lead role in this effort. “As a Jesuit law school, Boston College has been, and must continue to be, a first leader in the quest for social justice and legal equality for LGBTQ individuals,” he says. “It is an honor to provide seed funding for the training of future lawyers who will be the needed promoters and guardians of that vision of equality.”
Commitments totaling just over $100,000 have been received thus far. Efforts are now under way to reach the goal of $250,000 in order to name the first Legal Equality Scholar. Until then, income from the fund will be used to support financial aid.
The LGBTQ Legal Equality Scholarship Fund initiative is aligned with another development at Boston College, the establishment of the LGBTQ+ Alumni Council, which last spring joined the University’s roster of more than a dozen identity and professionally based alumni affinity groups. The organization is a forum for dialogue, connection, and education among BC alumni who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer, or an ally.
If you are interested in making a charter gift of any size to this new fund, please contact Maria Tringale, director of development, at maria.tringale@bc.edu or 617-552-4751.
How Scholarship Funds Help
Funds like the new LGBTQ Legal Equality Scholarship Fund are crucial to the Law School’s continuing excellence and diversity.
1,680
BC Law donors support financial aid through annual gifts
69
Endowed scholarships
177
Scholars whose financial aid awards are made possible through contributions