South Carolina State University has seen an increase in giving, according to university officials.

“We’re at $3.6 million today on overall giving compared to what we were last year during this same time frame, which is very significant. That number last year was right at $2.5 million,” trustee Jameel Allen Sr. said during a May 4 board meeting. He’s chairman of the Public Relations, Institutional Advancement and Alumni Relations committee.

“The level of just commitment to giving is up by all stakeholder groups, with a large emphasis coming from our national alumni association. So hats off to (association) President Hank Allen and all of the alumni chapters,” Allen said.

He reported S.C. State has also developed a committee which is working with Greensboro, North Carolina-based Beacon Technologies on the development of a new website.

“This committee is really focused on the right fundamentals and making sure that we put a product out there that’s going to be a living testimony of being able to recruit and also serve as a platform for our active students, alumni association and other stakeholders as well,” he said.

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Allen continued, “The university leadership has made a decision to ensure that different stakeholder groups are involved, which will encompass different focus groups, including alumni, current faculty, staff, students and board members. Those meetings have already started taking place.”

Sonja Bennett-Bellamy, S.C. State vice president for institutional advancement and external affairs, said the new website development is a massive undertaking.

“From start to finish, it’s about a year. Right now, we are in the strategy and design phases, and then we’ll go into the coding development and the testing of the site and further work on the functionality piece by the end of the year. Hopefully, we’ll have a launch by about then,” she said.

Bennett-Bellamy also reported that the university’s scholarship gala netted $278,302.

“We are already well on our way to planning the next gala,” she said.

She reported that university’s electronic publications, Bulldog News and Bulldog Class Notes, are among its marketing strategies, along with a Student Entrepreneur Campaign, where students who own their own businesses are featured.

“We’re doing a great big overhaul of the university’s photography library. So over the past several weeks, we have been on campus and University Center Greenville getting new shots. These shots are going to end up in our publications, you’ll see them on billboards and the like,” Bennett-Bellamy said.

Hank Allen, president of the S.C. State National Alumni Association, said the association was looking forward to working with new S.C. State President Alex Conyers.

“We understand the importance of student recruitment to the university, and we have been working very closely with the admissions office,” Allen said, noting that the association has already worked with the office on recruitment activities, including Upstate Day with the Greenville and Spartanburg alumni chapters.

Sponsored research and IT

Trustee William Oden, chairman of the sponsored research and information technology committee, reported that there had been a total of 28 grants and contracts submitted from July 1, 2021 to April 30, 2022, for a total of $27,885,832 and a potential indirect cost of $3,100,789.

Elbert Malone, associate provost for sponsored programs and research at S.C. State, said, “When we get to the end of the fiscal year, we anticipate that we’re probably going to be somewhere in terms of our submissions right around $35 million to $40 million.”

“We expect that we’ll probably get somewhere around 35 to 40 percent of those dollars. So you’re looking at about $14 million to probably $16 million that will be converted to monies that are coming to the institution,” Malone said.

He continued, “We have a renewed spirit of departments across the campus now looking at these opportunities and trying to figure out how they can reenter the grant and contract arena. So we’re very excited about that.”

Malone also reported that the university had received a little more than $4 million in federal Title 3 Part B funding, which can be used to not just upgrade academic buildings, but support information technology improvements.

Oden also reported that the university was continuing to make IT upgrades.

Contact the writer: dgleaton@timesanddemocrat.com or 803-533-5534. Follow “Good News with Gleaton” on Twitter at @DionneTandD

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