UWG
News Item
Contact: University Communications & Marketing
Phone (678) 839-6464, FAX (678) 839-6645
ucm@westga.edu
Sarners establish scholarship
March 14, 2003
CARROLLTON, GA - Russell and Mary Sarner of Fairfield Plantation have pledged a $50,000 gift to the University of West Georgia Foundation to establish the Russell G. and Mary A. Sarner Presidential Scholarship Endowment Fund. Starting in 2003, the couple will give $10,000 a year for five years to endow a Presidential Scholarship for students with exceptional academic ability.
The
Sarners are establishing the scholarship fund to help promote the University’s
mission of educational excellence in a personal environment.
“Students should be encouraged to achieve their highest level of education, and there is no better place to do that than West Georgia,” said Russell Sarner.
The Russell G. and Mary A. Sarner Presidential Scholarship will be awarded annually by the UWG Honors College to a student who has achieved a minimum high school grade-point average of 3.5 and a combined SAT score of 1200.
The Sarners have also included the University of West Georgia in their charitable remainder trust.
The couple, who have six children, have been active advocates for youth in the community for many years through their involvement with the University and with Georgia Court Appointed Special Advocates (Georgia CASA) and Carroll County CASA, which they founded. CASA is a nonprofit organization that trains community volunteers to serve as advocates for abused and neglected children involved in juvenile court deprivation proceedings.
The Sarners also founded the Friendship Force of West Georgia and are active in Friendship Force International. Mary Sarner was named Friendship Force International’s U.S. Volunteer of the Year in 1991. The two serve on the Citizens’ Panel Review of the Carroll County Juvenile Court and are active at the local, state and international levels of the Kiwanis Club.
Russell Sarner retired from Abbott Laboratories as Southeastern Regional Sales Manager in 1985, after 39 years with the company. He became a member of the University of West Georgia Foundation Board of Trustees in January 2003. He also serves on the boards of Greystone Power Foundation Inc. and Carroll County CASA. He served in the U.S. Navy from 1944 to 1946.
Mary Sarner served in the U.S. Marine Corps during the Korean War. Born in England, she moved to the United States in 1952 and is the current state president for the Daughters of the British Empire in the USA, a charitable organization that owns and maintains four homes for elderly people of all nationalities residing in the U.S. She is on the Magnolia Ball Committee and the board of the Emergency Shelter, and she has served on the board for Alice’s House.
The University of West Georgia depends on alumni and friends for private financial support. Donors can benefit the University and help fulfill their personal financial goals by making current or deferred gifts through the West Georgia Foundation.
Gifts can be made in the form of cash, stock, real estate, tangible property or bequests through a will, trust, insurance policy or other planned giving instrument. They may be unrestricted to provide the University with the flexibility to use the resources where the need is greatest or they may be earmarked for a specific endowment, scholarship, program or project.
For
more information about the UWG Honors College and applying for a Presidential
Scholarship, contact the Honors College at 770-836-4449. For information
about giving opportunities at West Georgia, contact Scott Huffman, associate
vice president for development and alumni services, or Mary Jane Goodson,
assistant director of development, in the Office of Development and Alumni
Services at 770-836-6582.
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