Celebrating student excellence each year, West Chester University’s Presidential Scholarship Community Gala draws more than 400 friends from across the state to an annual benefit designed to fund Presidential Scholarships for WCU students who have earned academic distinction.

Like many events in the nation this year, however, the spring 2020 scholarship gala was cancelled due to a global pandemic that has prompted the necessity to practice social distancing and limit public gatherings.

Upon hearing the financial challenges that students and their families continue to experience due to the COVID-19 outbreak, numerous sponsors of the gala have made the decision to redirect their gifts to a Student Emergency Aid Fund that has been explicitly established to help students who have been impacted directly by the health crisis. To date, $114,023 has been given by generous community partners and individuals to the essential-need Fund launched by the WCU Foundation.

“Scholarship assistance, housing, food, basic goods, and services — countless avenues of support for our students are required at this critical time,” wrote WCU Foundation CEO Christopher Mominey in a letter to alumni and other friends of the university. “The WCU Foundation, in collaboration with our dedicated corporate partners, has established the Student Emergency Aid Fund to assist WCU students who are experiencing hardships and finding themselves with financial and emotional struggles that they never saw coming.”

The Student Emergency Aid Fund will assist WCU students who are facing technology gaps that were previously filled through existing on-campus resources; confronting unanticipated expenses due to reduced work hours; experiencing financial aid and tuition payment difficulties; and who are working through the new challenge of completing the semester remotely.

West Chester University students who are experiencing difficulty due to the COVID-19 pandemic are urged to apply for assistance through the following link: Student Emergency Aid Appeal. Members of the community who wish to help these WCU students are invited to click here to learn more.

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