FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Tuesday, August 15, 2000
Contact: Lynn Stewart, Centenary News Service, 318-869-5120,  
or John Kemp, Louisiana Board of Regents, 504-342-4253

Louisiana Board of Regents Announces Completion of Funding for Two $100,000 Endowed Professorships at Centenary College 

SHREVEPORT, LA -- Members of the Centenary College community gathered today (Tuesday, Aug. 15) to hear Dr. Joseph Savoie, Louisiana commissioner of higher education, announce the completion of $200,000 in funding for two new endowed professorships for the college. 

The event marked the completion of a local and state funding effort which matches $40,000 from the Board of Regents Support Fund with $60,000 raised by Centenary for each endowed professorship. 

Centenary President Kenneth L. Schwab announced that the monies provided will partially support the Centenary Leadership Institute (CLI) program and fund CLI Faculty Fellows.  "The Faculty Fellows will incorporate leadership theory into the courses they teach, supervise leadership internships and service-learning programs, identify and bring successful leaders to campus, and teach in leadership workshops," he said.
 
The Faculty Fellows will receive released time, stipends and mini-grants, and will supervise and participate in leadership team projects, organize and conduct field trips, and supervise students interested in presenting papers on leadership at conferences, he said. 
 
The professors will be chosen based on their own successful leadership demonstrated on campus and off, Dr. Schwab said, and they will represent varied disciplines in the humanities, social sciences and natural sciences. 

"Each of these endowments helps to support a gifted faculty member and gives our students the highest quality instruction," Schwab said. 

Participants in Tuesday's presentation also included members of the Board of Regents, the area Legislative delegation, and representatives of the Centenary administration, faculty, staff and student body.

The newest professorships bring to five the number of Leadership Professorships at Centenary.  The first two were awarded in 1998.  The third, awarded last year, is the Wiener, Weiss and Madison--Centenary Leadership Endowed Professorship, named in honor of the Shreveport law firm.
 
Schwab praised Gov. Mike Foster, the Louisiana Legislature, the Board of Regents and the Louisiana Association of Independent Colleges and Universities for making higher education a priority. "Support of higher education in Louisiana is critical to our state's success in the future as we all work to provide the best resources available to our students," he said. 

The endowed professorship program is part of the Regents' innovative Support Fund, which began as a permanent trust fund approved by the voters of Louisiana in a 1986 constitutional amendment. By 2000, the trust fund had risen to over $896 million. The funds were part of a settlement between the state and federal governments over offshore oil and gas revenue. 

Each year the Legislature appropriates half the interest from the fund to the Board of Regents, the policy-making and coordinating agency for all higher education in Louisiana. The other half goes to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education for grades K-12. 

Centenary now has a total of 30 professorships endowed at $100,000 each, nine Eminent Scholars chairs endowed at $1 million each, and one Eminent Scholars Chair endowed with $2 million, for a total of $13.8 million in conjunction with the Regents Support Fund. The endowments were made possible through the generosity of college donors, whose funds were matched 60:40 by the Board of Regents Support Fund.
 
Another eight endowed chairs at the College were funded prior to the beginning of the Support Fund. 
  
  
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