The Catholic Community Foundation strives to be the best stewards we can be of the resources established to forever support the ministry of Catholic school education in the Diocese of Saginaw.
The foundation manages more than 90 funds that distribute earnings to Catholic schools for tuition assistance, books, college scholarships, teacher development and compensation as well as school operations. Annual distributions can exceed $100,000.
Earnings directed to specific schools are evaluated for use by the school administration with assistance from the Superintendent of Catholic Schools for the Diocese of Saginaw, Cormac Lynn. He assists the foundation in evaluating grant proposals related to Catholic schools. “I was humbled to learn of the extensive number of funds and the assets available to support the continual improvement of our Catholic schools,” Lynn said. “The funds make it possible for our schools to flourish and enrich the student experience academically and spiritually.”
School administrators use the funds in a variety of ways to underwrite strategic projects. Recent examples of fund use include implementation of new world language curriculum and the establishment of a “makerspace,” a hands-on learning center designed to cultivate student creativity and application of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math).
Some endowment funds were established by a single generous donor while others were created by a community of donors. Regardless of the fund’s origin, anyone can contribute to any of these funds that consistently help our Catholic schools thrive.
While some funds are intended to support individual schools, there are other funds that are intentionally broad and intended to support general Catholic school education and the teachers that make education possible. Other funds exist to support parish based faith formation programs; these funds can be specific to individual parishes or general by design so as to serve a broad application of ministries.
Additionally, the foundation manages accounts that direct earnings to support broad Catholic formation ministries including community-based programs such as Youth Encounter Service and continuing education opportunities such as the Lay Ministry program.
Gifts come in many ways, and there are no restrictions on the size or number of gifts that can be made to endowment funds. To learn more about making a gift or to explore a full list of existing funds managed by the Catholic Community Foundation, contact the foundation office 989.797.6627, or visit their website at http://www.ccfmm.org.