Syracuse University was the only college I truly applied to. I still remember the excitement of seeing that thick envelope in the mailbox. Its aerospace engineering program sparked my imagination, and though I had never visited campus, I was drawn to its academic promise—and its reputation as a men’s basketball powerhouse in the 1980s.
As a Pell Grant–eligible student and valedictorian of my small parochial high school in Youngstown, OH, I assumed, or at least hoped, that envelope would include a full ride.
It didn’t.
What it did include was a harsh awakening: an acceptance letter followed by a staggering tuition bill—with no roadmap for how to afford it.
Sadly, not much has changed for college students in the 35 years since I declined my invitation from Syracuse and enrolled at Youngstown State University, where my Pell Grant and small scholarship covered my tuition in full. In fact, the challenges have only gotten greater.
Student debt has doubled in the last two decades, and this escalating financial burden is hindering the future of our young people and putting our communities on the brink of true economic disaster. Millions of borrowers, already trapped in a seemingly endless cycle of debt, are now facing the prospect of being pushed into bankruptcy as the federal government resumes collections.
If we truly want to close the wealth gap and reimagine economic mobility, we must go beyond check writing and toward models that scale equity and opportunity—and trust in young people’s potential to build a greater future.
The Greater Futures Scholarship Fund
As the Hartford Foundation, a community foundation in Hartford, CT, began preparing for its 100th anniversary, we asked ourselves a simple but urgent question: What legacy do we want to leave for the next 100 years?
“This isn’t just about covering tuition. It’s about rewriting the future for hundreds of students who stand at the edge of ambition and uncertainty.”
Like many of our community foundation peers, we’re proud of our history of helping young people realize their potential through scholarships. Our scholarship program has awarded nearly $30 million in scholarship funding since 1945—creating a pathway for more than 6,000 students to attend college.
However, it was also abundantly clear that its previous annual $3,000 award no longer met the escalating challenges and financial needs of today’s students.
To mark our centennial, we launched the Greater Futures Scholarship Fund, reimagining what a community foundation can do by making a $30 million commitment to invest in our young people, our city school district, and ultimately, our future workforce.
For us, this project represents a powerful and timely opportunity to take what our foundation had built over 100 years and assert our power to create new and better opportunities for deserving young people by supporting these youth with resources—money, yes, but also mentoring, tutoring, and other forms of wraparound support —otherwise unavailable to them.
Tackling a National Crisis at the Community Level
Recent national conversations about the student debt crisis have largely focused on what we can do to help those who have already accumulated significant debt. We believe there’s an opportunity to ease this crisis by making it possible for students to avoid accumulating debt in the first place.
In that context, we decided to focus our milestone on a transformative investment: eliminating student debt for future generations of Hartford’s youth and reshaping how philanthropy invests in advancing economic opportunity beyond Hartford.
The Greater Futures Scholarship Fund catalyzes our potential as a regional community foundation to craft and implement local solutions to a national problem and, at the same time, create lasting solutions through empowering the future leaders of our communities—in part by freeing them from the burdens of debt.
The Intervention: What We’re Doing Differently
The Greater Futures Scholarship Fund provides Hartford Public School students with up to $100,000 over four years. However, unlike more traditional scholarships which often stop at tuition, we recognized that promising students also needed support to overcome the roadblocks—emotional, academic and other—that have hindered so many of their higher education journeys.
“We’re not waiting for national policy to catch up. We’re acting now because every student deserves not just a chance to attend college – but to do so without the burden of debt.”
Equally important to the financial award, the Greater Futures Scholarship provides a decade of wraparound services such as tutoring, financial aid counseling, academic coaching, mental health support, and career mentoring to help students excel before, during, and after college.
These wraparound services—provided by a trusted and respected nonprofit partner, Hartford Promise—represent just the type of support I (and so many students like me) would have benefited from immensely during the transition from high school to college so many years ago.
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What Makes This Different
This is our attempt to fill a policy gap—and to challenge philanthropy to think beyond scholarships and toward systemic change.
Here are some of the reasons why we think this program represents a model others in philanthropy should consider:
- It’s place-based and equity-centered
Rooted in one community’s history and aimed at addressing deep-rooted disparities.
- It’s holistic
Going far beyond tuition to support mental health, career pipelines, and long-term stability.
- It’s scalable
With a $30 million investment to expand access from more than 110 students in the Class of 2025 to more than 500 annually, we’re building a model other communities can adopt.
- It’s catalytic
It shows what’s possible when philanthropy shifts from short-term giving to structural investment.
The Impact
In cities like Hartford, where generational wealth gaps persist, the cost of college often translates to long-term financial hardship. We didn’t just want to help students access college—we wanted to help them complete it debt-free, thrive after graduation, and build generational wealth.
Once they graduate, scholars will have the opportunity to build their careers—and their lives—without the constraints caused by overwhelming debt. This will give them more freedom to purchase homes, start families, take career risks, and improve physical and mental wellbeing. As a result, this program can help change the narrative about the impact of debt on young people and its opportunity cost on individuals, families, communities, and our broader economy.
“This is our attempt to fill a policy gap—and to challenge philanthropy to think beyond scholarships and toward systemic change.”
The Greater Futures Scholarship Fund will also have tangible benefits for the city of Hartford by providing incentives for families to live in the city and send their children to city schools. As a result, the initiative is more than a scholarship program. It’s an investment in Greater Hartford with a multiplier effect.
Where to Go from Here
Community foundations were born to serve the public good—but we believe their next century must be defined not just by attracting investments and transactional grantmaking, but by bold investments that transform systems.
The Greater Futures Scholarship Fund offers a fresh approach for how philanthropy can support student success, workforce development, and economic growth at the community level.
It also sends a message to businesses and the public sector. By partnering with community foundations and other philanthropic organizations, local and state government has an opportunity to invest in a cost-effective approach to helping students succeed in high school, college, and beyond. Likewise, strategic investments in workforce development and economic mobility will directly benefit businesses’ bottom lines.
Philanthropy has an opportunity to be clearer with businesses about how they can contribute to a more skilled workforce, increased homeownership, and stronger local economies where talented young professionals live, work, and lead.
As an anchor institution in this community for 100 years, we believe this scholarship program is one of the most powerfully transformative actions we can take to show our commitment to our region now and into the future.
All things considered, I am proud to have been accepted into Syracuse University and equally proud of my decision to attend Youngstown State. I have no regrets and would not change the path that my college and professional journey has taken.
However, if I could go back in time, I would wish for one thing to be different. I’d wish for the existence of a program like the Greater Futures Scholarship Fund. The support that the program provides opens a world of choices for students who, unlike me, perhaps would have made very different decisions.
This isn’t just about covering tuition. It’s about rewriting the future for hundreds of students who stand at the edge of ambition and uncertainty.
We’re not waiting for national policy to catch up. We’re acting now because every student deserves not just a chance to attend college—but to do so without the burden of debt.
And that, we believe, is a legacy worthy of the next 100 years.
